On Reclaimed Wood

To be perfectly blunt, I use reclaimed wood to craft the majority of items in the shop.

Reclaimed wood. I suppose it conjures up different romantic notions in people, but when it comes down to it, it is simply a fancy way of saying I use recycled wood found anywhere and everywhere. Seriously, you can't imagine how much lumber waste lies around us, no matter where we go.

There are pallets, of course- these I'll find just about anywhere. From industrial sites who have a sign on a stack of them trying to get folks to haul them away (these make great fire wood, by the way), to the front of houses. A short drive will easily net me 2-3 useable, hardwood pallets. So much so, that I have to remember if I have the room currently to pick them up.

Then, there's everything else. Trash days are fantastic for gathering, as I can expect anything from broken chairs and bed frames to split butcher blocks and rough-cut tree trunks. 

I'm serious, the stuff is everywhere.

After collecting, I'll bring it back to the shop like some deranged scavenger and begin to dismantle the hardware, then mill it down to useable pieces. It must be clean, it must be attractive and it must be able to perform the way I want it to. 

It doesn't take much effort, and the end result is that there's little to no material cost passed on to customers in the final product. I like that, and I'm sure they appreciate the savings as well.

If you're curious, just look at what's being done in the shop with other people's trash-