Iron Bark Kimono

9ish years ago I decide that for a wedding I'm attending in Italy I needed to stand apart from the rest of the wedding attendees.  You know, every man would be wearing some western style suit and I had to be different. Through some friends I contacted a seamstress/artist to make me a kimono (and a custom shirt) to wear.
She and I went fabric shopping together and we spent quite a bit of time designing and talking about it.  She meticulously hand stitched it together with the finest of stitches.  Very cool.
The wedding attendee's are being seated and like the very last of them taking their seats are a big family all dressed in traditional African garb, totally colorful and beautiful and pretty much took the thunder out of the kimono.
 
 Since then the seamstress/artist have been trading work back and forth.

This will be the third piece of furniture I've built for her (and this one is destined for the husband).

Iron Bark Eucalyptus.  Just having arrived in the studio from the Marin jaunt.

This morning I lightly ran them through the planer so the grain and sweep of how the tree grew can start to dialogue with me.

I'll try and take you through the build of it.  But right now, I'm just at the looking and listening stage.

Staying Here Stain There

Stayed Here

Stained Here

Stay There

Stain There

My Excellent Day with Ken

Ok, so the only reason I'm involved with this is I milled some slats of wood for Ken.  That's it.  Ran some wood through some machines to make them long thin rectangles.
But I told Ken I'd like to see where everything was going to be living and could I traipse along with him when he delivers the first group of them.

Them being some outdoor chairs and benches (and tables to come) that Ken designed and built.

Half are aluminum, half copper. Cute side tables that attach to the chairs for drinks and whatnot.  A couple are taller director chairs for around an outdoor pool table.  This post will about the pool table area, the bocce court chairs and benches will be later.


Before we get to the chairs, we need to talk about Slugger.  The copper one and the furry one.
Ken made a sculpture of the client's dog, Slugger.  The face over time turned a bit dark so Ken did some touch up.

And in an art imitates life imitates art moment the copper and furry come together.

I feel a peak life moment coming now, don't you folks?

Sooooooooooocuuuuuuuuute!  Apparently we now know Ken likes to kiss with eyes closed.
The drool under him I'm hoping is Slugger's.

Now that we have that out of the way...let's get back to the chairs.
Really a beautiful way to play some pool I think.  Under a low hanging Oak.  Shots that go off line because of a fallen leaf or acorn...well, that's all part of it.  Like life itself.  Can't blame gravity for a loss.

The aluminum chairs are punctuated with marbles...sort of like pool balls I guess, all colorful and round.

The copper chairs three times as heavy, variegated with how copper ages.
Nice place to put your feet while laughing at your opponent's ball glancing off an acorn.

Rest of my excellent day with Ken was spent being hand led through a collector's private art museum that lasted for hours because of the vast vast amount of art...fucking cool ass place.  We even needed the Petaluma Fire Department to provide some directions to it because it was so far off the beaten path on roads back in the hills with no names.
I asked the collector if he would allow a wedding to be held there......something I need to talk to Taylor about.

Day finished at Branchline with me asking Robert the bartender.  "Robert, can you make me a gin based cocktail....something I've never had before, please?"
Ken ordered one too.

The West Coast Cats

TT of course says......

MB of course says....

"Fuck yes! Jules!"

Buddha Head says....."Oooooooom yes! Jules!"

Jules, our 13 14 year wunderkid is off to Nashville tomorrow for some studio time with the real Nashville cats.

So cool Jules...so cool.
The west coast cats say good luck.

Feral Star

Kabo-om Kap-ow 

Arc-ing A-ban-don 

 Rad-io-active Rib 

Art-iculate Awakefullness.

Aroma as Object

Maybe because it's one big room or maybe that it's made from 10,000 bricks each with 100 nooks and crannies or maybe that the exposed rough sawn roof is like velcro.
But for whatever reason, aromas here become an object, a three dimensional thing that doesn't want to leave for days.

I started the bread yesterday, roasting cumin seeds from Turkey, sesame seeds and steelcut oats.  This morning, the aroma was as palpable as yesterday.  I think it becomes a micro thin layer of patina.
Added some dried Sevilla orange peel to the dough.

The aroma is as physical as the walls or the doors or the 11' skylight.

Burnt a bit of Palo Santo, roasted up some green coffee beans (oh my god, the smell of that! Roasted Chocolate and smoke) and the bread.
Should sell it. Maybe open as a popup aroma venue.  Somehow.
It will still be here tomorrow and probably the day after.

My First East Coast Show!!!!

Fred got a shop.
You don't need to know Fred to know Fred if you've been to his shop.
First impressions are first impressions.  It's messy, it's filled to the brim with flotsam.
And jetsam.
I doubt there's a sharp chisel in there.
He throws em in a drawer.  Yeah, they're a crisscrossed jumble of old and tired chisels in a drawer.
You think, so this is Fred.

But spend some time in there.
Walk around quietly.
Observe and feel.
See how this object fits in with the object next to it.
How that picture on the wall just seems so perfect in it's placement.
The big window,
The shape of the roof,
The parts of finished projects on the walls
The parts of yet to be finished projects all around.

And sooner or later you'll see that the shop is nothing but an exquisite piece of performance art.
And if you're there with Fred to talk about stuff you'll see everything is placed for a higher reason.
Nothing is by chance.
It's all visually pieced and placed together in the most beautiful of FredSpiritLogic.

Fred's got all of Dad's tools.  I was always flying in there and couldn't take anything with me.
Fred...well he would drive his truck and load up for the trip back.

Dad had a shop.  A basement shop (and a two car garage that couldn't hold cars because both of them were filled to brim with crap.)
Many fathers come home from work and mix up a gin and tonic first thing.  Not Dad.  Maybe he would throw five minutes of ball with us but soon after he headed in to change out his white shirt and tie for work clothes.  Into the shop to make something or out to the garage to maintain something.
Thing is Dad always bought crap tools. I don't have a problem with Fred having them.  Really.
Well, I did like that car jack he had.  It was green right Fred?  I think you could've jacked up a house with it.
Maybe that huge block and tackle...I could use that.

And Dad had his father's tools.

Grandpa had a shop....well, he must've but I don't remember it.  See Grandpa made violins...and repaired violins...so he must have had a shop....and taught violin.
Dad got his tools.
And Fred got those too.  It's only right that he did.


See Fred is an architect.  He's also a contractor.  He needs those things.

So whenever I do something wood related and a write a blog about it I send Fred a link to it.

The recent door I made I sent a link to Fred, he writes back "I liked one of your photos so much I had Jean print it out and we put it in the front window.

Fred has an old late 1800's brick building in the old section of a historic Virginia town.  18 W. Washington St. Lexington.

My first east coast show!

Love you Bro.