How it's made

How It's Made is a documentary television series that premiered on January 6, 2001, on the Discovery Channel in Canada, and Science in the United States. The program is produced in the Canadian province of Quebec by Productions MAJ.

The show is a documentary showing how common, everyday items (including clothing and accessories like alligator handbags, foodstuffs like bubble gum, industrial products such as engines, musical instruments such as guitars, and sporting goods such as snowboards) are manufactured.

An off-screen narrator explains each process, often with humorous puns. Each half-hour show usually has three or four main segments, with each product getting a demonstration of approximately five minutes; exceptions are allowed in the allotted time for more complex products. Usually, every show has at least one product with a historic background note preceding it: Showing how and where the product originated, and what people used before it. Watch series online for free; here and you might learn something useful.