WOODWORKING
This section features examples of my fine woodworking projects using domestic and exotic hardwoods. My interest in this medium came about in part by way of antique furniture and friends in the restoration business, and quickly began filling long summer days out on my roof deck. I have over a dozen more pieces in the works, and when those are complete I may go back to painting and other media that doesn't take quite so much time.
Lantern in the Rain, 2021.
7.25" x 7.25" x 12.5"
This piece was a pandemic coping project following a slew of misfortunes and mostly irreversible losses, though I also made some meaningful gains and advancing my skills with this piece in particular was certainly one of them. It's about 495 pieces of birch, mahogany, maple, ebony, pine, and ziricote. Each of the four sides features a kind of pop-art vision from overhead of rain drops falling toward an umbrella, and the top of the lid is ringed in comet-like amulets and a sort of simplified compass rose emphasizing the radiance of the carved flame. Underneath the lid is a wonderful piece of ziricote - perhaps my favorite wood - that seems to resemble clouds either gathering or breaking.
Ziricote inlay in the underside of the lid.
Val d'Orcia, 2022.
5.25" x 3.75" x 13.25"
This began as a fairly uninspired project but ended up a satisfying expansion of my design sensibilities, motivating me to continue that expansion. This piece also features relatively little inlay and very simple turned elements. I named it after the region of Italy often portrayed as a paradise, topping it with wenge spires that evoke the Tuscan cypress and in a trio that hints at Christian symbolism. Inlaid into the lid and footing are pieces of olivewood sand-burned at the edges to blend it into the wenge, and the faces are a spalted wood of some kind - either maple or tamarind - with this dramatic marbling pattern that I thought well enough to leave alone.
Scotch Glass Caddie, 2016. When my father asked for some nice glasses for his single malts one year for Christmas, I took the opportunity to house them in something both sophisticated and practical. This carved and inlaid caddie was made entirely from scrap hardwoods - mahogany, cherry, walnut, maple, pear, poplar and oak - and joined without metal. When entertaining guests, it balances nicely for transport to and from the bar using the handle that T's up from the middle.
Maple Leaf Box, 2016. This was a birthday gift for my mom, the last piece I joined with any metal as I transitioned to fine woodworking, and an early exercise in inlay. The case is poplar with a dark blue ink stain and roughly 50 maple leaf inlays cut from maple wood, some figured, and some mitered to wrap around the edges of the box. This arduous technique gets a considerably finer result than just stenciling the pattern, and leaves sharper borders between the colors. The interior features the phrase "maple leaves floating down the river" inscribed into the lid, a dark blue felt lining, oak tongues, and brass hardware. The iron branch handle was purchased at a hardware store and given a gold patina finish.
Desert Box, 2017. This was an early experiment in woodworking as I answered the siren song of tropical hardwoods - a cube form in purple heart (known for its unforgiving density) and a base, lid, and inlay in yellow heart with the drip portions mitered at the top edge to minimize the exposure of the inlaid layer. The idea may lead to a themed series, as well as incorporating street art concepts into future pieces. This one wasn't intended to be a show piece, just a means of testing an idea. For a finished version I'd do something like pinned box joints and a simple rounded foot in yellow heart.
Various lidded boxes given as Christmas gifts in 2017, some of my earliest successful pieces as I developed a general construction strategy and attempted various inlay designs. You may notice that the piece in the lower left features figured birch casing and mahogany trim, just like Lantern in the Rain - that piece began with the first lid I cut for this much simpler piece, it was a little too loose fitting so I put it aside and cut a second one. Little did I know I'd not only find a use for that spare lid but that it would be used in such a milestone of advancement.
Dice Tray, 2018. A friend commissioned this piece in spalted maple and walnut for his gaming hobbies, essentially just a box without a lid and a raised interior base for easier visibility of the dice. Most trays have a textile surface to muffle the sound while rolling, which admittedly is pretty loud in this one but it's worth it for the visible detail.
Various turned and inlaid reliquaries given as Christmas gifts in 2018. While I hesitated at first to invest much time and money in turning, for a few reasons, the lathe proved to be an addictive tool in the otherwise slow-paced world of woodworking. Production time is a small fraction of what it is for rectilinear and polygonal pieces, and as such the challenge tilts further toward form. So I tried a variety of designs here. Woods include maple, walnut, cherry, goncalo alves, zebrawood, osage orange, cocobolo, wenge, yellow heart and red heart.
Another commissioned piece, this one for a friend for his mom's birthday in 2019, in bloodwood and zebrawood with a sand-burned fan inlay in tiger maple, ebony and pine. (Burning the individual fan blades with sand is an old technique that gently maximizes the depth of the char so that the finished detail can be sanded smooth without losing the shading effect.) The figuring in the tiger maple gives a sense of motion to the fan, which I like, and the striping in the zebrawood subtly skews the angular appearance of the box, in a mildly amusing illusion. Under the lid are the initials of her three children inlaid in pine.