South Easthope Mutual's old tree into new woodwork

South Easthope Mutual in Tavistock decided that they had out grown their office space in Tavistock Ontario. They had enough space to build in their empy lot beside the old buliding. In the middle of this lot sat an old butternut tree. As it happened they approached me to do some woodwork/furniture in their new office with this old tree. The problem was that butternut is becoming an endangered species because of a blight causing canker. There are serious restrictions on removing heathy trees. This tree could not be removed and the project could not move forth until a biologist determined the health and exact species. As it turned out this tree had a few structural issues and it was determined to be a hybrid and not an indigenous butternut. The project moved forth.

I did one whole wall in butternut in their heritage room and a mantle in the entrance. There will be a coffee table to follow in a further blog post. This butternut was a joy to work with. 

Chopsticks

Chopstick making is just a fun diversion from larger projects.

How to make chopsticks- a photo essay

Large maple rounds from Toronto

This was another interesting project that I did for a customer in Toronto. They had a huge maple in their back yard. The tree had to be removed. The largest of the three rounds that I made into tables was 7 feet across.

White oak counter top

This was a commission to build a countertop to match a new kitchen cabinet installation. It turned out that a natural white oak matched perfectly.

What makes a cutting board and how to care for it

Function 

• A cutting board shout be easy on knives but at the same time hard and well wearing
• Wood for boards should be non porous and well seasoned with a non toxic mineral oil and bees wax
• A board should be flat (sit firmly on your counter top)
• It should have sufficient mass (heavy enough to accomplish the task but be easy to move around your kitchen)
• It should be constructed from non toxic waterproof glue

Form

• A cutting/serving board should be simple, beautiful, and tactile

Care

• Cleaning can be accomplished with a dry or warm damp cloth
• Boards can also be occasionally washed with soap and warm water but not submerged and they should be re seasoned afterward
• After washing boards they should be stored carefully on edge to dry
• Boards should be dry when they are re seasoned
• Maintain seasoning with mineral oil or beeswax polish
• Regular maintenance will keep the boards looking fresh. Just a lite wiping with oil or wax
• Resurfacing can be accomplished with a red scotchbrite pad or fine steel wool
• You may wish to dedicate one side for cutting and the other for serving or display

Cheers Wayne

making an end grain cutting board

Recently I began an exploration into the construction of segemented end grain cutting boards(or butcher blocks). This mostly began by request of local culinary shop owner Carrie Wreford of  Bradshaw's of Stratford . She challenged me to create something uniquely "Muma" and of lasting quality. I wanted to create both individually unique boards with an acceptable small scale production process. As it turned out this exploration presented artistic, technical, and process challenges. Not as easy as I expected. I also expected that I would need a small scale production thickness sander to accomplish the production time efficiently. Another noisy dusty machine to clutter up my already cramped shop. As I started experimenting with these machines a few serious shortcomings became apparent. First of all, I would need large batches of very consistently thick "board blanks" to make the process efficient. This was going to severely limit my creative process (another whole blog discussion). On top of which these blanks would still need a significant amount of random orbital sanding. Which for me defeated the idea of using a production sander in the first place. Frustrated I turned to my low angle hand planes to see if I could come up with a process to surface end grain cutting boards. I am finding huge benefits to using my #62 low angle jack plane. I am achieving a flatter surface and removing milling marks as or more time efficiently without the use of noisy dusty machines. Crazy as it sounds I will be hand smoothing my end grain cutting boards with low angle planes. The #62 low angle jack was put into production in 1905 and discontinued in 1942 until it's present day resurrection by Lie-Nielsen Tools. Please check out my cutting boards at Bradshaw's of Stratford.