Reid Hendershot, Studio #6

Posted on August 16, 2021

I have been surprised by what beauty I can find in a piece of wood that has been found in the yard of a neighbor, found at the yard waste site, or donated to me…much wood from storms (plentiful in recent years) has hidden cracks from twisting or bending, but helping neighbors take down trees yields some treasures…

Two doors down, Donna had a standing dead ironwood tree she wanted removed…having used dead standing ironwood in the past I was aware of its high density and long-burning quality, but paid little attention to it otherwise. After sawing it into lengths I could lift I noticed waviness in the bark…

I slid a log section onto my bandsaw and discovered this wavy bark was an indicator of the wood within…I made a few butter knives from it that people seemed to like and found the wood finished well, with the wavy grain seeming to glow…

While much of the wood is straight-grained, areas around each knot yielded more and varied figure. These spatulas are all from the same trunk segment.

I made a little stand for one of these as an entry into the Northfield Arts Guild Member’s Exhibition for September.

I chose “Firewood’s Dream” as the title.

While using “found wood” doesn’t give me premium wood like I could purchase, it does challenge me to not overlook anything…now…if my neighbor’s ash tree dies I have a hunch where to look for interesting grain…

Meanwhile, this critter likes hanging out at the workshop…