First Stab at Carving Utensils

With all of the typhoons and local storms we've been having this season, there has been a corresponding bumper crop of driftwood on the beach. You can only collect so much before you have to do something with it, so, after finding a pretty cool knife in the hardware store that boys across Japan used to keep their pencils sharpened with, I decided to start hacking away at a few of the pieces I gathered.

Here are the admittedly amateurish results.

Though I am happy with the grain that's been exposed in these, the shapes are a little wonky yet. Worse still, I've used a really fragrant piece of wood to carve the butter knife — a no-no perhaps for something to be used with food.

I did find this excellent book in our local bookstore to help me going forward. It's called "Hand-made Wooden Cutlery"(手ずくりする木のカトラリ) by Nishikawa Takaaki.

Not only does it show some really fine pieces including a cherry wood butter case, but it has step-by-step instructions for creating some of the more difficult pieces, like boxes and bowls.

All right, it's out. I'm in love with wood. At least I'm in the perfect place to carry on the affair. We'll see if it's lasting. I think it should be.

I just need to find me some walnut or gingko.

I do know where one of those is....

More Good Design

You see corrugated sheet metal barns and warehouses all over the place out here in the "countryside." Usually they are in some state of rustiness and/or dilapidation. Utilitarian structures to the extreme, they are fairly quick and cheap to put up; fairly quick and cheap to tear down.

Normally I pass by without giving them a second look. But this one was special. This one had style.

A simple wooden door — made from cedar I'm guessing, the hills are lined with the stuff — and everything square, level and true.

Echosquirrel likes the tiny recessed handles. I like the ensemble. The flimsy and the solid existing together. A craftsman's paean to simplicity.