All From One Log
How many things can I make out of this one log?
A 760cm long, 160cm diameter log of green cherry wood. It had been felled by a farmer down the road and lay on the floor of my workshop while I scratched my head. I often find I waste some wood while making things and I was curious to see if I could plan well enough that I could make use of all of this lovely piece of Cherry.
Trying to plan how to use a log while it’s just lying there on the floor, I found it really difficult, but after sawing it in half, I could more easily visualise how to go about using the wood in the most efficient way possible. I initially wanted to make two footstools, however I realised there wasn’t enough wood there to make two, so settled on one, and then tried to leave the rest in as useful pieces as possible.
After splitting out all the pieces needed for the stool; four legs, four seat rails and four rungs, I shaved them down and let them dry a little before assembling the stool.
Once the stool had been assembled and oiled, it was time to practice my seat weaving skills! I had some Danish cord left over from my first chair project and wanted to have a go at a more complicated weaving pattern.
I was left with a nice piece that I could make two bowls out of. Turning them on my pole lathe created a pile of beautiful curly shavings, that I could burn in my wood burner, on a cold day. I tried to make the two bowls as identical as possible, something that I need to work on, but it is very pleasing to see them together and see how they were oriented within the log.
There was a nice long piece that was cleaved to be an extra leg for the stool, but it wasn’t needed in the end so this turned into a large cooking spoon! Another little piece that was destined for the wood pile was turned into a tiny rolling pin for my kitchen. And what was left after all this, was a pile of wood chips, and lots of little pieces of offcuts. I wanted to use all these pieces, despite some having cracks in and being too dry to turn on my lathe. I decided to carve them all into little vessels. Even the smallest pieces of wood I would normally not bother to use, have become something beautiful and to some, maybe useful.
