I don't know much about mechanical keyboards, but I decided to build one. I was inspired by open hardware projects like the HacKeyboard and the Keyboardio 01, but I wanted something less flashy with a layout more similar to what I am used to using. I like the ISO style enter key and backslash key, but I prefer the ANSI style left shift key. I also wanted a full number pad and 12 function keys. At that point I thought I might as well include the 'Home', 'End', etc. keys as well in the interest of keeping things familiar. I saw no need for backlights or any LEDs other than the usual capslock, numlock, and scroll-lock LEDs. (Even those seemed fairly unnecessary, but I opted to stay close to conventionality in hopes that the project may be of more use to others that way.)

I chose the Atmel Atmega3U4 microcontroller so that I could leverage the wealth of existing free and open source keyboard firmware available for that device.

The PCB is designed, but untested so far. The hardware is open source and licensed under the CERN Open Hardware License. Schematics and PCB files in KiCad format can be downloaded via GitHub.