Authentic Nautical Accessories, and Custom Furnishings
Figureheads get lots of attention in maritime museum exhibits. There are even museum collections of figureheads lost at sea. Often, the names of the ships they graced are unknown. If we knew, we could reconstruct a travelogue of all the ports they'd seen. But many ships lacked figureheads. The old figure went overboard in a …
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, a Drummer was not just a percussionist. A drummer was a traveling salesman who'd make the rounds with tools, clothes, or anything else you might wish to purchase but could not easily find at the small retail establishments in your town. Think no internet, no Walmart, and few …
Yesterday, I spent a significant part of the day working on a carving of a large schooner. I based it on research I did for an earlier schooner built by the same yard around the same time in the late 19th century. I used skills acquired in the earlier carving to ease the work on …
Photographs help me remember steps and processes. Years ago, I used photography only to record the results. But pictures of the in-between stages were more than a bit helpful. One of the big reasons I say this is because there are some things that I only do rarely. Reminders are valuable.I need to be a …
If you studied economics, process engineering or are an enthusiast of popular psychology, you might have heard of the Sunk Cost Fallacy. It's alive and well in woodcarving too. Sunk costs are costs you have paid and can't get back. That's fine if everything works out. But if the project just hasn't been the success …
This is my second run at the Steam Yacht Zaida. I've used different techniques and am more satisfied with the outcome.
I found the wood sitting in the shorts at my favorite hardwood dealer. It was very dark, heavy, and dense. It was mahogany but so dark and heavy that I felt it was a wayward piece of Dominican, not Honduran. It was just what I wanted.
We all want to be instant experts. One of my sensei describes this in terms of the training montages that are standard fare in martial arts movies; the neophyte progresses from clumsy beginner to skilled pro in thirty seconds of cinematic snapshots.
I admit that the sort of non complex carving that happens when I carve a small bowl is pretty alluring. No antsy detail. No pattern that needs to be followed. Just follow the will of the wood.
We can easily get lost in the weeds talking about tradition in crafts.
This chest was not in stock long enough for me to do a proper set of photos. It sold at it's first appearance at the Maine Boatbuilder's Show to a pair of Boston Harbor pilots who were going to give it as a retirement gift to a colleague.
As consumers, there is much that you don't know about your favorite woods.
It sails on my wall with a cherry ocean and sky heading east from Japan or China towards Los Angelos. I think my father is pleased that his ship is restored to an essential place in our lives, through the unexpected kindness of a fellow seaman.
While teaching, I always like to decorate the workshop with carving examples for students to use as a reference. Week-long excursions to teach away from home mean emptying the house of many of my carvings. But samples in three dimensions often are better than pictures or demonstration, and the extra work was worth it.
The problem with imagination is that it's boundless. On the wall is a poster telling you that you can do it if you can imagine it. Don't take it too literally.
Traveling around in the sixties, I got lots of perspectives on what people thought happiness was. Well, for everyone but me. I was sometimes moving so fast it was a blur, a sort of Doppler shift of experiences and locations. Zoom...I was outta there! Of course, a lot of my rationale for moving around was …
I had two intense nine-hour and then twelve-hour work days together this week. It's unusual, but for some reason, things at the station and the needs of people just exploded. So my travel guitar, Charlie, has hung on the wall mostly silent. Yes, I am back to pretty much daily practice again. But as I …
“No one starts a war--or rather, no one in his senses ought to do so--without first being clear in his mind what he intends to achieve by that war and how he intends to conduct it. “Clausewitz
That's right! How have I grown this year? It's in the things for which I don't give a damn! There are a host of things that don't upset me so much as they did. Nope. I don't bounce about the room in rage, or go on patrol to terminate those on "the enemies list." It …
Give my twenty-year-old self advice? Let's see, put it into a horoscope? Or appear to the sleeping lout, I mean Lou, out of a bright incandescent cloud, brandishing a book of future events? Nah...he just figured it was some bad weed he'd smoked. Actually the young fool alredy had access to some very useful advice. …
Never been to a real Medicine show? Doctor Crystal's is about as close as you will come...lucky you! shot and edited many years ago, a friend who was in the video wanted to see it so I reposted it for him. I thought you folks might be interested, too. So here it is: https://vimeo.com/1201613743?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci
And the number is 746 Very large and accurate model of a passenger liner on display at the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts. Indian Pink. One of my favorite native plants. it's just coming into bloom in my garden now Looks like the escapee committee is digging another tunnel! The Festival of Fools in Burlington, …
A guide to forming healthy boundaries in a relationship? You've come to the right place. Ever since ancient Egypt, when we domesticated humans, we have struggled with this. Frankly, it's often been a bit of a mess. Just as soon as you think you've struggled to the crest of the pile of blankets on the …
It's a long way to Mars, and it's not going to be either a cheap trip or a cheap job to get a settlement established. So my questions are not so much if we can or should do it, but what sort of terms and conditions will exist if we do it. Who foots the …
Ohhh, it's wrong at so many levels, but I like it. As satire, it lays bare what's wrong with our love of memes, a sort of reduction to triteness of things. But we probably love them just because we yearn to squeeze some humor from the increasingly humorless situations of life. There they are, hero …
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