John Billings
Photo: Jesse Grant/WireImage/Getty Images
Meet The GRAMMY Man: How The Golden Gramophones Are Made
Meet John Billings, aka the "GRAMMY Man." He and his small but mighty team at Billings Artworks in the tiny mountain town of Ridgway, Colo. make all of the GRAMMY trophies that winning artists at the GRAMMYs and Latin GRAMMYs proudly take home every year. Watch the video below to hear from Billings himself on the joy he finds in his craft.
Before Billings became the "GRAMMY Man," he was a dental student in Southern California in the '80s, and went to learn casting under the original GRAMMY maker, Bob Graves.
Unfortunately Graves was terminally ill, and shortly before his death asked Billings to keep the tradition going. So Billings moved to Colorado to start Billings Artworks and keep the hand-crafted, American-made tradition alive for the GRAMMY trophies.
"Each GRAMMY we make, in our minds, it's going to a superstar, you know it's going to somebody who's given to us, to our lives, and now we're giving back to them." Billings said. "We're a small company in a dusty little shop, in a tiny little town in the mountains, but our work is recognized around the world and goes around the world."
