A few weeks ago I wrote about the auction where I purchased some old English Elm. I’ve now had a chance to work with some of it and I can happily say that it’s really nice wood to work with.

Many of the slabs unfortunately weren’t dried properly so they have some splits and checking on the surface. This means that it’s difficult to find wide pieces to work with or pieces for finer wood working. For the stuff that I intend to make however, it’s still damned fine enough!

Long English Elm Bench

Over the last month I’ve been busy putting together my first piece from this stack. A long bench. It was also my first commission (unpaid, requested by my wife, but I think it still counts!) You can see my progress here on Flickr. I apologise for the poor picture quality. I should have my real camera back in a week so should be able to take some better quality pictures from here on.

It was also a new experience in finishing. I’ve been using Shellac mostly but this time I went with polyurethane instead. The final concoction was:

1. Sanding sealer (1 part dewaxed white shellac : 5 parts methylated spirits)
2. 4 coats of Minwax wipe-on Polyurethane
3. 1 coat of Ubeaut EEE (a kind of cut & polish)
4. 1 coat of Wax

I absolutely love the end result. It’s durable and shows off a lot of the grain features in the piece. Definitely a process I will use again.

Next on my list is (in no particular order):

• A few smaller benches from the English Elm
• Coffee table from the English Elm
• Coffee table (Huon Pine & Blackbutt)
• Coffee table (Sassafras)
• And I’ll try my hand at a few small boxes

This reuters article about Facebook and YouTube at work making employees more productive has been doing the rounds lately. After reading the article, various blog posts, being in a “feedback” style meeting yesterday and then listening to a This Week In Tech episode that mentioned it (albeit only briefly towards the end), a number of threads began falling into place for me.

For me, this issue is more about the duality between your work and non-work self rather than what technologies you’re allowed to use at work. Let’s explore this using two examples …

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English Elm at an Auction

A few weeks ago I participated in my first timber auction. I came back with two large trunks of an English Elm tree. This wasn’t just any ordinary tree either …

These trees were cut down from outside the MCG in 2001 to make way for the new stand they were building. Instead of turning these old trees into woodchips for mulch (which is what was going to happen), a few thoughtfull “woodies” arrange to take the trees, slab them and dry them over a few years before selling them to fellow woodies. I think this is a great result for trees that were otherwise destined for woodchips.

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