While travelling recently, I came across the make magazine. The edition I picked up, had some great technology projects in there covering a mixture of eco-friendly ideas, along with advice for the sustainable garden along with other more practical advice. They also have a blog where they post a mixture of “cool” and useful ideas/projects. Earlier this month, they featured a post by a young Fashion Designer from New York City named Diana. Funnily enough, it wasn’t about fashion. It was about her favourite activity in Amateur Radio, which is “Catching satellites on ham radio“.

Several things surprised me about the post. Diana is, well, a girl, and fashion designer at that. Why is that surprising? The hobby is heavily biased towards (middle aged, overweight) men. The antenna in the picture is homebrew, i.e. it looks like she made it herself (I particularly like the orange tips on the antenna elements).

Even “within” the hobby, a lot of folks don’t bother homebrewing anything, they just hand over hard earned cash. I’m guilty of this myself as much as anyone. (Though in my defence, my current HF antenna’s are a mixture of wire, fishing poles and pull-ties).

Lastly, I don’t know of a) any fashion designers, b) girls, c) girl who homebrew, in the hobby. I think it’s great! Welcome to the hobby Diana, and I hope to work you on the bands at some stage.