Monkeypuzzle

I was offered some wood from a Monkeypuzzle tree some months back – the tree was planted in the front garden when the chap (now quite a few years older) moved into his house.

I’ve left the wood for six months or so and today I got around to turning the first bowl. It was immediately evident that the wood was far from dry, so I just rough turned it and will leave it on the shelf for another 3 months or so. Here it is at the moment…

I am not at all sure how it will turn out as the wood seems quite open-grained so might not finish too well, but we’ll see in a few months.

Here’s one for Jeremy…

A couple of years ago I made a long round trip to darkest Worcestershire and picked up a load of wood from a colleague. This was dumped in the back of the car, driven 100 odd miles back up the M6 and then stuffed under the bench in the barn where it’s been sat ever since then.

I’ve turned the odd small piece since then (primarily into mushrooms), but today I fancied tackling a bowl so dug out a reasonably sized lump and had some fun with the sledgehammer and wedges, so that I could start with something that wasn’t too large.

I then cut the corners off the lump and stuck it onto the lathe – here’s a picture from half way through the turning process…

I’ve just hot-glued some Iroko to the base so that when I turn it around to mount it I don’t have to screw into the base of the bowl.

It turned out really well, despite nearly flying off the faceplate when I was finishing the base – here’s the finished article…

It’s easily the most beautiful bowl I’ve made, I’m looking forward to cracking open another lump to see what I find inside!