THE ART OF WOOD CARVING & WOODWORK

John Lange

John has been making a variety of wood creations from wood of many kinds, especially since he retired some 16 years ago. Items range through furniture, jewelry, magnets, candle holders, lamps, canes, cremation urns, wine bottle stoppers, ikabanas, cribbage boards, and more. He especially enjoys working on a lathe, so roundness is evident in his work. He lives in St. Cloud with his wife Rita of 57 years, and summers on Woman Lake, enjoying some fishing and gardening.

Bob Seemann

Ever since a shop teacher introduced Bob Seemann to the joy of working with wood, it’s been his life-long passion. Over the last 40 years, he’s built everything from custom cutting boards to armoires and from grandfather clocks to saunas. In his shop in Longville, Bob works with oak, maple, walnut, cherry, birch, mesquite and pine.

Hal Bitzer

Hal started carving around 1990. For Hal carving is therapeutic and relaxing and it has also given him the opportunity to learn more about his Scandinavian heritage. Hal has taken classes with instructors from Norway and Sweden, learning kolrosing, chip carving, bentwood and creating shrink boxes.

Dave & Kathy Towley

In our wood turning, we strive to marry form with function so as to please the eye as well as to satisfy the hand. Self-taught, this journey of discovery continues to surprise and delight us as we never fully know just what we may find around the next ‘turn’. In our work we hope that you too will find a quiet pleasure in the nature of the wood transformed.

Ken & Charlotte Johnson
Northwoods Sleigh Company

Charlotte and Ken Johnson are Northwoods Sleigh Company. They are of Scandinavian decent (Swedish and Norwegian) and have been handcrafting Scandinavian gift items for over 35 years. They make delicate wooden trays in several sizes. The trays are constructed with compound mitered finger-joints at all corners. Additional, they make a line of decorative wooden sleighs patterned after those used by emigrants for logging and farming. They also make small Tomtens (dolls) to complement the sleighs. All of their products are designed, hand-crafted and merchandised only by them. They have participated in and sold their artifacts at numerous Scandinavian Festivals.

Jerry Wervey

Jerry Wervey’s work is a wide array of wood turning from the simple to elegant with a dash of abstract. He create some bowls from box elder, which show the true beauty of what can lie under an unassuming layer of bark. Utility bowls are what Jerry makes the most varying in size and shape as well as the wood itself. Most of the wood is gathered off his property. For the light of heart, he create tops, a universal toy enjoyed by both young and old. Enjoy his creations from Wooden Inspirations.

Joe Tkalcich

Joe has been working with wood over 40 years. He started out making furniture and cabinets in the early 1970s. Twenty years later, he quit that and started making intarsia (art made with a variety of small pieces of wood). His wife, Tami, creates the designs and Joe crafts the intarsia cutting small pieces of different species of wood on the band saw.

He also creates wood personalized signs, engraves them on site at shows so customers can take them home completely finished the same day.

Quentin Gmach

Quentin creates a variety of items from many different types of wood. In creating tables, he may use juniper from southern Minnesota which are rough sawn boards that he planes and cuts to optimize the beauty and different color found in the tree. The tales have beautiful grain patterns and contain natural live edges.

Serving Trays are made with walnut, birch and red elm. The knot holes are inlayed with genuine turquoise or copper. The bottom of the trays are finished with an epoxie to waterproof and enhance the grain of the different woods.

Cutting boards are made with birch, walnut, ash and red elm. A different combination of these woods gives each cutting board a different look and uniqueness. The boards range in different thicknesses.

Quentin also recycles when making tables. He uses an old factory pulley with a glass top fitted in place. The leg is a natural but unusual wood growth, and the pedestal is from an old floor lamp.