You can purchase these cutting boards on my Etsy page:
Saw n' Claw - Rescued Wood Designs
I work at a mass manufacturing plant here in Colorado, where I form hundreds of pieces of beautiful maple into products. As the products we create need to be almost perfect, like within an 1/64th of an inch perfect, we need to use several test pieces of wood which we call setup pieces to make sure the machines we are using are set perfectly. Many of these pieces are comprised of wood that is visually marked or warped, so it wouldn't be good for the product anyways. Sometimes it can take up to 10 setups to get it right. At the end of the day, these setups are discarded. I save as much as possible, loading up my car full of beautiful maple wood and scheming what I can make with it all.
Many of these pieces are full of holes, saw marks, and mortise and tenons making them difficult to impossible to use as is. I cut and mill the pieces to a point that they are usable. Sometimes though, I use the whole piece for furniture I make for my home, because I really don't mind the holes and cut marks as it shows the story behind the piece.
When it comes to these cutting boards, I have mostly used pieces that were either deemed visually unsuitable, warped, or were cut offs from cutting lumber down to size for other products. I dig into the trash cans and fill boxes full of these little pieces seen as trash, and then meticulously mill and glue each piece together to form these cutting boards! One of my coworkers called me a "sucker for misery", though I prefer to look at things a bit differently...
The trees, and nature are the ones who are suffering, and we are the ones benefiting from that suffering. The way I see it, I am putting some of my precious time and energy into transforming the suffering we cause to the natural world into something worth it's pain. If we are going to cut down trees, we might as well use every bit we can.
These designs were inspired by the odd shapes that were formed during the glue up phase, making sure I was using as much of the wood as possible, and not just cutting off what I didn't want. This method turned into the wonderful drippy and wavy edges you see! It also inspired some funky handle designs as well. I am so glad the wood inspired these shapes, because to me, they reflect the strange beauty found in the natural world that the wood comes from. Drips of maple sap from the maple tree. The waves from the lake shores and rivers the trees rely on for water. I look forward to exploring more shapes and sizes and offering different kinds of products for you guys on my Etsy page (link above)!
The Process
Final Boards
