ABOUT SLY DESIGNS
In a small Arizona workshop, Sly Designs is raising the bar for magic. Too many magic props are cheap, mass-produced gimmicks made overseas, with poor fit and finish and inferior materials. Our answer is thoughtfully engineered products, made with a blend of precision manufacturing methods like CNC machining and meticulous hand craftsmanship. We invent original sleight of hand magic, illusions and card art for close-up performers, collectors and anyone who loves a good mystery. Every prop is designed, prototyped and tested here in the USA, and we make as much of each product as we can, from domestically sourced materials, right here at home.
Meet the Owners
Sly Designs is run by two friends who met at a 50K trail race: a magician who used to be a geologist, and an aerospace engineer who never stopped building things. Both are ultrarunners, and both believe a magic prop should be engineered as carefully as it is performed.
Sam Sléibhín, Magician and Inventor
Sam is the creative mind behind the products. Before magic took over, he worked as a geologist. He holds a Master’s degree in geology, has published peer-reviewed scientific articles, and wrote the novel Field Camp. Sam is a U.S. Army combat veteran and an accomplished ultrarunner who has finished multiple 100-mile races in mountain and desert terrain.
Adam “The Engineer” and Machinist
Adam holds a degree in aerospace engineering and has worked professionally as an engineer supporting parachute and air delivery test programs, aerospace software development and the fabrication of aerospace components. He’s a machinist and fabricator at heart. He takes an engineering approach to Sam’s sketches: turning ideas into CAD models, selecting the materials, programming the CNCs, designing the artwork and packaging, and owning the quality of every product. His favorite tool might be the Sly Designs graph paper notebook, where every failure, lesson and plan gets written down. Adam is an ultrarunner too, with 100-mile races of his own, and an avid outdoorsman.
What We Make
NEUTRINO
Our flagship solid-through-solid effect. Twelve precision-machined pieces of 303 stainless steel are assembled with the spectator into a solid block about the size of a deck of cards. An ordinary playing card then passes straight through it, even lengthwise, before everything is handed out for examination. It is self-working and can be performed completely surrounded. NEUTRINO sold out at Magic Live!, and on Magic TV Craig Petty said it “fooled me completely and totally.”
Infinity Chalice
Four half dollars dropped into a sleek, double-ended vessel penetrate solid metal one by one and fall out cleanly at the bottom. It is fully examinable, easy to perform and deeply deceptive. Choose the no-expense-spared stainless steel luxury edition or more budget-friendly options.
How We Make Things
We approach every project with an engineering mindset. When our creative department (that’s Sam) comes up with an idea, Adam tackles it the way engineers are trained to: Given, Find, Solution. First we define exactly the illusion we want to pull off and write down the requirements: what the audience should see, what the performer needs, and how the prop has to hold up. That means a lot of brainstorming and rough prototypes, from crude sketches to cardboard and scissors.
Then we design, prototype and test until every requirement is met. Each product is drawn up as a 3D CAD model, then drafted as a 2D manufacturing drawing with tolerances, surface finish requirements, material specifications and quality control checks.
Graphic design here works similarly, but it’s less rigid. Where our engineering follows a more linear process, our artwork and packaging come together more loosely. We brainstorm, mock up ideas and iterate a lot until a design feels right. Because we make most of our own packaging in-house, from pad printing and laser engraving to foil-stamped boxes and tuck boxes built from the ground up, we can try a new idea and have it in our hands fast, without waiting on an outside print shop.
Many of our metal components are precision CNC machined in-house from materials like stainless steel and aluminum. Our 3D-printed props use premium American-made ASA and ABS plastics, not the cheap PLA that warps in a hot car.
To program our CNC machines we use CAM (computer-aided manufacturing) software. It turns the 3D model into the toolpaths the cutters follow and lets us simulate every cut before any metal is touched.
Our precision machine shop includes:
- CNC mill
- CNC lathe
- Manual mill
- Manual lathe
- Laser
- Pad printer
- Hot foil stamping machine
- 3D printers
Coming soon: a wire EDM and a plastic injection molding machine.
Quality Built In
For us, quality isn’t a last check before a box goes out the door. It’s planned from the start. Quality assurance only catches problems at the end. Quality management designs them out before they happen. That’s why we write a quality management plan that sets the requirements, the critical dimensions and how each one is inspected. When something does go wrong, we don’t just fix the part. We write a formal corrective action report (CAR), find the root cause and change the process so it doesn’t happen again. Our race to get NEUTRINO’s tolerances right before Magic Live! is a good example, and you can read about it on the blog. How many magic companies do you know that have a quality policy? We do, and you can read our quality manual (PDF).
Before a new part goes into production, the first one off the machine gets a first article inspection (FAI). Every feature is measured against the drawing, and the results are recorded in a first article inspection report. Our measuring instruments, from calipers to surface roughness testers, are calibrated traceable to NIST (the National Institute of Standards and Technology).
Made in America
We design and manufacture our products in the USA, and we go to great lengths to source American materials and support American workers. In the few cases where a material can’t be sourced domestically, we use trusted global suppliers.
Where to Find Us
Shop direct on our site, with free shipping on items over $50 in the US, or through our preferred retailer, Meir Yedid Magic. You’ll also find us at magic conventions like Magic Live!, 4F and MAWNY, and on our YouTube channel, where we go behind the scenes of how magic is made.
