Some of my work
Some things are pretty typical and are standard in all of my pieces. A lot of those things are because I like the challenge, or to honor the traditional ways of woodworking. Some are simply because it's how I believe certain things should be done.
One of those things that fall in the first category, is that nearly every piece that I make, personal or commissioned, contains no metal. This simply means that I use traditional joinery techniques to keep the pieces held together, strong, and built for longevity. There are some exceptions of course, such as the magnetic knives below, but rest assured the techniques I use to join pieces are more than secure enough to function, last and support whatever it needs to. It's not unheard of for entire frames of houses in Japan to be made using some of these same techniques. Check out my blog where I talk about all my thoughts on this and more!
Knives
This knife was made from curly maple for the blade, and cherry for the scales. As with all knives, it is 100% food-safe and can be used to cut cakes, fruits, vegetables, and other soft foods.
This knife was made for the same customer and has a curly maple handle and a Patagonia rosewood blade.
This is one of my favorite of all the knives I've ever made. The blade is made with a beautiful, and semi-rare, piece of olive wood. The handle is made from walnut and finished with a food safe mineral oil to ensure it stays looking beautiful.
Magnetic Knives
These knives are one of the few exceptions I've made when it comes to the no-metal rule.
For this project, a customer told me that he wanted a set of knives. After tossing a few ideas around between us, we landed on knives that would "stick" to a bar, just as a regular knife would stick to one of those magnetic knife bars you can buy from pretty much anywhere.
I'll admit it...this project kicked my butt. Figuring out how to get the magnets concealed in the knives, and them being strong enough was HOURS and HOURS of research, and [several] attempts and failures until I finally got the knives to do and look the way they do.
For this project I did 3 different knives in all different styles.
The black and red knife is a santoku knife. The blade is made of the appropriately named blood wood, while the handle was crafted from Gaboon Ebony. It, while the heaviest knife in the set, was the easiest knife to complete.
The white and black knife is a cleaver. The blade itself was made from spalted hackberry, while the handle was made from Macassar Ebony.
The Macassar ebony is also what the border of the wall-mounted knife bar is made of. I didn't think that the Gaboon ebony would have held up as well on the bar.
The final knife is made of zebrawood as the blade, and Gaboon ebony for the handle. The zebrawood was chosen because the grain pattern and color, I thought, flowed beautifully with the shape of the knife. The Gaboon Ebony is a pretty rare wood, and by far one of the two most expensive woods I've worked with.
Miss Nova's Bed
