Earth

We rely on the earth to provide us with so much.  Food, for substance; Plants, for oxygen; raw materials to provide us with shelter and so much more.  In much the same way I rely on the earth to provide me with the medium for which I do my work.

Every piece of wood that we use to fashion our creations is a symbol of the earth from which it grew.  This can be an exotic piece of wood like spalted maple or zebrawood to locally sourced willow oak or sycamore.  Often times it is the true beauty of the things around us that shine the brightest.

Water

As beautiful as the things are around us, and as rich the stories are that they speak, it is only through imagery that we can truly tell stories. This has been done over the course of our entire history as humans.  From cave paintings to Ancient Greece to the Renaissance to the modern day we discovered how to use water and pigments to create materials we can use to tell those stories.

Fire

Ah, my favorite, fire.  As a pyrographer, I like to “play with fire”.  Fire can be destructive but it can also be creative.  We use heat to create beautiful culinary dishes and mold metals to the shapes we want.  We use fire to turn clay into pottery.

I use fire to make designs.  By applying heat to wood I am able to draw lines, add shading, and create different effects that give depth to my pieces.  One of the things that I love most about pyrography is that I can create something unique, imperfections and all, that adds to the overall piece.

Air

Although the air may seem to many as just empty space air is also what carries things, and conducts things.  The smell of cedar being burned, the breeze that drys the paint as it soaks into the wood.  

All of the elements come together to make the perfect piece and all I can hope for is that the right person can find the right piece.  And that is exactly what happened this past weekend at a market in Charlotte.  We had our collection of four pieces: Earth, Water, Fire, and Air on display and a young woman noticed it and it spoke to her.  She went on to explain that she and her close friends had all gotten tattoos of the tarot symbols for Earth, Water, Fire, and Air.

Not every market to you finds someone who sees a piece you made and instantly connects with it.  And it is even rarer that when they do it ties into something deeply rooted in their lives.  But when you do it makes it all the more meaningful and true.

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Finding a Passion

When I decided I was going to start a business I knew it was going to be selling one of my many crafts. I had recently discovered Pyrography and really began to experiment with it. There was something about it that really spoke to me. I got to work armed with nothing but a trusty Walnut Hollow Creative Versatool I purchased decades ago. It was a piece of work. They hadn’t yet added temperature gauges and the tip was a solid nib burner (i.e. a solid piece of brass that has to be screwed in).

So I decided on the medium but now I needed to determine what to make and sell. Coasters are small and relatively easy to make. Drawing from our passion for board games my first collection was Classic Board Games: Checkers, Chinese Checkers, Backgammon, and Monopoly (before you say anything, yes, I have been made aware that the general consensus is that Monopoly is THE WORST). These were great but I wanted to challenge myself. Going to Brian, our resident boardgame guru, suggested coasters based on a tile-laying game where you create a French Medieval City. I asked him to choose the 4 best tiles from that game and those are now our best seller.

Expanding horizons

Brian always gives me many ideas and challenges me. Often times this is by suggesting the things that he, himself, would buy. Given the success of our board game coasters, he suggested a set of Lord of The Rings coasters depicting the map of Middle Earth. He found a map and helped me create the templates. We cleaned up, resized, and cut the map into smaller bits to fit on the coasters and it turned out fantastic. So what was the next, logical step? Burn the entire map of Middle Earth for Brian as a gift.

I started on the piece months ago working on it a little at a time. I would bring it on location to markets as a way to show people what pyrography is. Creating at markets is always fascinating. People love to stop, watch, and ask questions. 

Going Big

As you can probably guess we buy our fair share of board games to play together or with our friends. There is a local place, Your Local Game Store, in Charlotte where we usually pick up our games for our collection. It’s a nice little spot with a good selection of games and knowledgeable staff. It’s a nice atmosphere, and they even have nights where they teach games. 

As you can guess they have plenty of fantasy decor on the walls; posters, models of dragons above the doors, and even a painting of a dragon inside of one of the game rooms. We reached out to the to see if they would showcase one of my pieces on their walls, and they said YES!

I’ll be doing another map of middle earth only this time much larger. I have never done a piece this large, but I love a good challenge. You should never stop growing out of your comfort zone. The piece I am making is 24” high and 36” wide. I am using a solid piece of Sycamore a little over an inch thick for this piece.

I started it today and I can’t wait to update everyone on my progress!

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Our hand-burned “Welcome Home” signs are made to order specifically for you. We will take an image of your home and, using tried and true pyrography techniques, we will burn an image of your home into the wood. Hang it outside your door and greet your guests with a cheerful message or customize it with your family name or a special saying that means something to you.

Celebrate your new home with something that lasts a lifetime. The perfect gift for a housewarming or for the real estate agent looking for something to show appreciation to a client. Your home is as unique as you are, shouldn’t you have something to commemorate it that is as unique as well.

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The armed forces have always held a special place in my heart as many of my family, my father included, served our country. I hold a tremendous amount of respect for those people who protect our country and those who gave the ultimate sacrifice. I very much appreciated the opportunity to do something to give back to these individuals.

The seals will be hung up in a common area for all of the men and women at the facility to pay homage to their efforts. I hope they will serve as a reminder to them and to others visiting about how our great country wouldn’t be what it is today without their strength and perseverance. Thank you to all of you for your hard work and dedication.

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For the uninitiated, Game of Thrones centers around the Iron Throne. Whoever sits on the throne commands the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros and Essos. The Seven Kingdoms are overseen by noble houses, some of which claim rightful ownership of the throne while others fight for independence from the throne. Throw in an exiled scion thirsty for what they believe is rightfully theirs and a neverending winter fueled with undead and you have what became a story of intrigue, betrayal, coming of age, torture, revenge, and insanity.

The show ran for 8 seasons, to much acclaim, with the final season causing much uproar among fans of the show from season 1. 

What makes Game of Thrones so special is Martin’s ability to world-build. He created an entire kingdom with history, mythology, and conflict. This is similar to what makes many fantasy authors such as Tolkien and Herbert great. You feel immersed in the world. What better way to pay homage to the series than to create a custom, wood-burned image of the map of the known world in 11×16 piece of live edge maple. We made sure to include all the areas of interest calling special attention to the territories that the customer loved the most.

Pieces like this are why I started my business. Creating something that is beautiful, tactile, and something that will be loved for years. Hopefully, we’ll have many more commissions like this to come.

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