A triad of Deep Deck longboards in American elm, ready for trucks and wheels I’ve been making small batches of my Deep Deck longboard in the background of other projects in the shop, laying up a new deck each day, trimming, sanding and finishing the previous day’s cured laminations. Making decks at this scale has […]
Category Archives: material provenance
Stickered Table for Shed (process)
Two identical bases of green pecan, ready to receive the top, a giant slab of sycamore. Whenever I design and make a new piece of furniture, I’m always keenly aware of how it will age, and how the piece might transform over time to encourage and support future, as yet unforeseeable patterns of use. I’ve […]
Milling the Pecan Tree
My friend Sean Gavin mills logs on site with his portable Wood-Mizer I spent an action-packed weekend milling my first tree, a mature pecan (Carya Illinoensis) that grew in the sandy soil of a nearby horse pasture. The tree was beginning to die and had been dropping large branches, threatening the safety of the horses. […]
Coffee Table Series
The first in a series of coffee tables, a lozenge-shaped slab, 30″ x 72″ x 16.5″ high I’ve begun making a series of coffee tables, encouraged by a recent commission from my brother in law to make one for my sister’s 50th birthday later this month. It’s always easier to make things in small multiples, […]
Flotsam of the Day
Two views of an unidentified bone, presumably from a large fish or a sea mammal While running on the beach early this morning I was surprised to find a large, C-shaped bone in the sand, measuring about 8″ x 4″. My first thought was that it resembled part of a skate, a familiar inhabitant of […]
Kelp and Iodine
Freshly harvested kelp drying on the garden fence For a while after the recent tsunami in Japan, Californians were aflutter about iodine, the primary antidote to radiation exposure. In researching sources of the element I discovered that the Japanese consume about five times more than most of the rest of the world, largely because seaweed […]
Coincidences of High Summer
It’s been a bumper year for wild plums, and our few trees, bent to capacity with ripe fruit, have been feeding the birds, raccoons and a solitary bobcat, who harvests from our rooftop at night. We’re eating our share as well, and Ene has already prepared a few gallons of ‘plum brandy’ that should be […]