Roughed out in 2004 and finished turned in 2013, then subjected to 24 hours of ammonium hydroxide fumigation. Wipe on poly oil finish . 9x9in . $350

My interpretation of the Chapman Valve Co., Springfield, MA, internal gate hydrant first used more than one hundred years ago. The independent gates control the flow to the hose nozzles and are controlled by each of the bolts on top of the bonnet. The hexagonal barrel indicates that this version had a 5” valve opening in the water main below ground. This is mulberry, and the nozzle cap bolts are ebony. The mulberry cylinder was cast in red tinted epoxy resin prior to turning to fill the voids and the large crack. The lamp switch is controlled by the bolt head on the pumper nozzle in the front of the barrel. The base is 8" diameter and the lamp stands 16" to the base of the harp. The tree grew on the west side of Alabama St, north of Hwy 180 in Silver City, NM. No. 1100. The shade is handmade by Robin at Creative Lampshades in Beaufort, SC.

I modeled from this pic at firehydrant.org. I styled it with a flare at the base of the barrel.

Mulberry, Ebony, 16in . $2200

Chapman Valve Co, MA. I do like the old pot belly hydrant designs. This is a second run at a hydrant lamp. Arizona walnut (NM) with a curly sugar maple (WI) sidewalk base. The sidewalk is 8" square, and the lamp stands 15-1/8" to the base of the harp. At one second exposure, Charlie is a bit of a blur but he just had to help and track sawdust onto the backdrop paper. The right nozzle cap "bolt", walnut, is the rotary light switch . $750 lamp . $800 including shade

A Korean hydrant, inspired by an Instagram post by @fire_fire_fire___. The same post also suggested the sidewalk brick pattern. I was immediately attracted to the curve on the bonnet, and I knew I wanted to take on the challenge of fluting the bonnet along that curve, which was done in four passes of the router bit at each indexed location. The port cap chain attachment point is evident in other posts of this model. Calligraphy was done by @Sirhobinrood. The hydrant and sidewalk are cherry, from Wisconsin. All my models of real hydrants are impressions of the original, and are the result of making with poetic license, in wood, what was originally an iron alloy cast. The characters 소화전 translate to "fire hydrant". 6-5/8 along the sidewalk, and 7-1/4" tall. No. 1092, April 2020. SOLD

Back in the 1980s I had the good fortune to pick up three padauk boards, over 24” wide. I was told they had been cut thirty years or more before that. This is the second platter I made from one of those boards. It is 24-1/4” wide, and was finished back in 1992, and was on display at Whipple’s Gallery the following year. It has not been on display since. #644 . $845

Box Elder burl from windblown tree in Loveland, CO.

Finish turned in 1992, this piece was shown in the MRAC office and in Whipple’s Gallery in 1993, and was entered in the Poudre Valley Art League show in Fr. Collins, CO in 1994 where it won Second Prize of $1000. In 1995 it was in the Adobe Patio Gallery in Mesilla. It has not been offered for sale since. The piece measures 12-3/4” diameter and 10-1/4” high. Photo by Anthony Howell . $1200

Cleared by the City of Fort Collins, Colorado, this silver maple tree was dropped off at the Colorado State University wood lab. I obtained this beautifully curled piece while attending a turned wooden lidded container workshop at CSU. Note how light refraction changes as the piece is rotated. Like tiger eye stone, the bowl’s surface has a three dimensional appearance . 13.5x2.75in . $895

A sugar maple bowl with markings that resemble those in ambrosia maple, but without the worm holes. This bowl was rough turned while wet by Gary Pierce, a turner in Long Lake, NY, who then sent the rough cut piece to me to finish after it moved out of shape during drying. 11-7/16 x 2-9/16in . #1065 . $185.

ash with singed rim . forged steel

Collaboration with Jim Pepperl, Pepperl Forge, this piece won best of show at McCray Gallery Hot Art Show. This ash is a crotch where the main trunk split into two trunks . it grew on private land in Whitewater Canyon upstream from Glenwood, NM . $6500

restored rotted gambel oak . forged steel

A collaboration with Jim Pepperl, Pepperl Forge, first report on the tree that produced this was that there was a large burl on a dead and down gambel oak, second report was, it’s no good, it’s all rot. Not to be deterred, after some study, there appeared to be enough solid wood in the shell, which when combined with copious quantity of resins, might stay together without exploding during the turning process. The base of the bowl was designed in conjunction with the design of the top of the steel stand, such that the finished piece could rotate on the stand . $12000

This box elder is from a fully burled tree that grew in Loveland, CO. In 1989, it blew down in the wind due to rot and lots of larvae. The larvae damage to the tree is featured in the bottom of this vessel. I rough turned it in 1990, let it dry, and finish turned it in 2015. 8-3/4" diameter x 6". In Canada, box elder is known as Manitoba maple . $325

From a curb tree at 500 block College Ave, Silver City, NM, this piece displays some of the character that is often referred to as olive ash . $775

Gambel oak from a huge stump from a tree that was a casualty of the 2014 Signal Fire north of Silver City, NM. The cracks toward the bottom of this pic are filled with chilepox (red chile powder mixed into casting epoxy). This piece was rough turned, thickness around 1/10th the diameter, and set aside to dry. Once dry, it was finished turned, hence any movement of the wood during drying was smoothed. #1001, 14” x 4-3/4”, Tung oil finish . $885

chilepox . see above

in the making . see the two images above

Gambel oak, collected on a firewood permit from the 2014 Signal Peak fire area. Turned green, allowed to dry and move. I then filled with resin and leveled the crack inside, and sanded the inside smooth. The bottom is still quite textured from the movement along the curls of the wood in this crotch area between the two trunks of the tree. The movement of the wood during drying can be felt along the rim. #814, 13-7/8” x 2-11/16”. Tung oil finish . $425

box elder . forged steel

Collaborative work with Jim Pepperl, Pepperl Forge . $475

gray oak multi axis . $625
This planetary series started back in the early 90s and nine were rough turned on two axes while green, allowed to dry, then finish turned on the same two axes. This one produced a nice horsehead figure in the darker color tannin swirls.

Rough turned while still green, without time in a water barrel, allowed to dry, and re-turned dry . SOLD

This oak soaked in a steel barrel for a few years after being cut. The steel reacted with the tannin in the oak and darkened it. Green wood that won’t be turned right away gets submerged in water to keep it from drying and cracking before turning it into a bowl or vessel. Compare the appearance of this with the Lazy P vessel, which was turned right after having been cut from the tree . $495

This box elder is from a dual trunk fully burled tree that grew in Loveland, CO. In 1989, one of the trunks blew down in the wind due to rot and lots of larvae . SOLD

Gambel oak, collected on a firewood permit from the 2014 Signal Peak fire area. Turned and finished while still fairly green. This piece features the bumpy texture that results from the movement along the curls of the wood as it dried. The chatoyance is characteristic of the crotch area between the two trunks of the tree. The stump burl was collected in 2017, three years after the fire, so drying had resulted in cracking of the wood toward the outside of the stump. I filled the cracks in this one with epoxy mixed with red chalk like powder to suggest the fire that killed the tree. #812, 12" across x 2-1/2" high. Tung oil finish . SOLD

coulter pine cone from California

The coulter pine produces a cone with a large center core of soft but solid material from which the scales, or bracts, originate. When this material is impregnated with stabilizing resin, it holds together well enough to allow it to be turned . Cones are designed in nature to come apart and spread their scales to release their seeds so finding one of these whose growth was arrested and did not open is unusual. The one split in the cone was filled with epoxy mixed with graphite . SOLD

Coulter pine cone, cast in epoxy resin with chile powder (chilepox). Where I cut through the seeds (pine nuts), I dug them out from their seed covers, and filled those places with powder coat white mixed with epoxy, so that they would resemble the oily white seeds I had removed. Base is Gambel oak from the 2014 Signal Fire, a 5500 acre fire on the north side of Signal Peak north of Silver City, NM. This was a dead branch that burned up to the edge of the trunk where there was too much moisture to sustain the burn. Had help from Jim Pepperl with the forged steel holding the cone above the vent and with information on the behavior of various metals. Copper tentacles. 15” x 14”. No. 1029. Finished with tung oil blend on the oak. Available at Sterling Fine Art . $945

Apple, on a base of spalted stabilized alder. Turned on 4 different axes, this is the only one I have left from the back cover of the 2017 issue of American Woodturner, the journal of the American Association of Woodturners . 8.375 tall . NFS

Saguaro, stabilized, then cast in chilepox, or red chile powder mixed into epoxy casting resin. This is Birdsill Holly’s third and apparently his last hydrant design. 4 x 7.5in . $450.

A Protec Feu hydrant modeled after pics posted by friends who visited Morocco and found one of these in Marrakesh. This is from a very old and cracked oak burl. I turned the blank to a cylinder, oven dried it, and cast it in urethane casting resin to fill the cracks and voids. I added some color to the resin. 4-5/8 x 7-3/8" . #1066 . $425.

Tamarix, aka salt cedar, National Iron Works, Spokane. Modeled after a picture posted by William Burger to oldfirestuff group, and a pic from the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture . 3-3/4 x 8-7/16in . $495.

Rotten spalted red maple stabilized with resin. Birdsill Holly’s second model hydrant. Modeled after a pic on firehydrant.org. 4 x 6-7/8in . $450

Honey locust and granadillo, McAvity high pressure model used in Toronto after 1904 fire. Modeled after a pic posted by the Canadian Fire Fighters Museum . 4-5/8 x 9-5/16in . $495

Birdsill Holly was an inventor in the mid to late 1800s. He patented his first model of hydrants in 1869. This one is modeled after his second series of hydrants. Holly operated a waterworks plant in Lockport, NY, and distributed water mains and hydrants around town. This wood is honey locust burl from a tree that grew next to the old post office on Broadway in Silver City, NM . $400

Mildly birds eye maple, single port Birdsill Holly hydrant, patented 1869. The hydrant that I modeled from is still in use in New Orleans . 3-3/4 x 6-1/8in . $450

Holyoke Hydrant and Iron Works from the late 1800s. Most of the pics I have seen of this model either had no chains on the port caps, or had broken chains which is why I left the chains the way I did. 3-1/8in wide x 7-1/2in tall, #989. This purpleheart was once used by a community near Green Bay, WI in a park bench and was picked up at an auction. $385

Canada Valve and Hydrant Co, Darling B50B high pressure hydrant. This model has four high pressure (up to 600lb per sq in) hose ports, each with its own control valve on top of the bonnet. There is a central control that operates the valve at the water main below frost level and wets the barrel. Mesquite base, gambel oak barrel from the 2014 Signal Fire near Silver City, NM, and a blue mahoe (from Puerto Rico) bonnet . 4-3/8 x 8-1/4in . No. 1040. This was a custom order. SOLD

Exquisite locally sourced materials, labelled.
$80 each

Exquisite locally sourced material pens, cholla stands included as supplies last.

coulter pine cone pen and stand . $240

A coulter pine cone, masquerading as a closed end pen. It was an open cone, and most of its seeds were already released. The scales were band sawed off close to where their stems appeared out of the core of the cone. It was then stabilized with methacrylate resin in a vacuum chamber, and baked. During turning, there were multiple applications of epoxy and ca glue to further solidify the surface and fill gaps . SOLD