the story of capworks

Hi, my name is Josh Stolberg.  I am an engineer by training, but an artist at heart.  It all began in college when I started collecting caps for no apparent reason.  Several years later, I had thousands of caps and too much time on my hands. My wife and I created a full suit of Roman Centurion Armor for Halloween. This demonstrated that caps can be a versatile artistic medium. We decided to try something simpler and made bottle cap flowers for all our holiday gifts.  A few of our friends were so impressed they requested we make some small crafts to sell alongside their food cart business.  Since then, we've flourished into our own business while creating a myriad of sculptures, wall pieces, and smaller crafts.  We currently work out of our maker-space, Build, RVA, in Richmond, Virginia.

Our art stems from our love of craft beer and the desire to recycle the leftover materials.  Our work is mainly assembled using cutting, bending, and crimping techniques we have come up with.  This is accomplished primarily using only tin snips and needle nose pliers and a press for flattening caps.  And yes, we do cut ourselves occasionally.  Almost all caps are donated by a network of friends, family, local businesses, and people we meet around town.  In the last several years, we have expanded to include recycled cans, labels, and packaging in our work. Please see the Donations page for details on how you can contribute.