Flattering my figure...

Holy cow, look what's been hiding at the bottom of the woodpile.  I brushed the dust off and ran this 9 inch wide plank of pearwood on the jointer, and look what I got.  (My knees go weak...)  

That's some pretty flamboyant figure happening there.  Whatever shall I do with you, dear darling delicious one?  I'm going to leave you where I can see you every day, and just wait for inspiration to whisper in my ear.  

Ah, pearwood.  It handplanes like buttuh...love working with this stuff!

Anyways, anyone wonder why wood gets this crazy figure sometimes?  This pear plank has what is called curl.  It was cut such that the surface is parallel to the radius of the trunk.  Now if you were, instead of sawing, to split this wood with an axe along the radius and pull the two halves apart...wait, here's a picture.

 The right lower part has been pulled apart, revealing in three dimensions the waviness of the grain.  So when you cut across that radial surface, you are cutting through a series of abrupt changes in grain direction.  Light reflected off the wood will vary with the direction of the grain, resulting in that shimmery effect.  Impress your friends with this new word: Chatoyance.  It's root is French for "cat's eye", and if you are familiar with tiger eye gemstones, it's a similar effect.  Here, I'll use it in a sentence for you.

The subtle chatoyance of the freshly planed pearwood made Pam spaz out and drool a little.

Welcome to the shop!

 

Excuse the clutter, it's not always like this.

Sometimes there's lots of sawdust as well!  This is where I

work, and I welcome you to my blog where I will periodically share what I'm up to and occasionally spaz out about the latest splendid piece of wood I've acquired.  Who knows, maybe I'll even share some technical information.  A little science and engineering is good for you!

As some of you might already know, I've recently decided to enter the arts and crafts fair scene, so I've ramped up production in hopes of getting into a couple events next summer.  It has been a lot of fun spending more time working and playing with new designs.  Having a looming deadline in January for application to the fairs has lit a motivational fire under my ass and made me much more productive than I was when I'd work on one piece at a time.  Multitasking is clearly a necessity if I want to pursue this.

I've decided to go this route to get my work out in the world for a few reasons.  First, the idea of selling through consignment at a store leaves me cold.  I don't want to just be handed a check from some merchant every month.  I've been stuck in the garage, and frankly, I'd like to get out and actually meet the people that like my work enough to buy it.  Remove the dust mask, breathe fresh air, maybe even enjoy some conversation. Gosh, I might even meet interesting craftspeople while I'm at it!