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Plans are underway in the U.K. for the third Spoonfest 2014 – The International Celebration of the Carved Wooden Spoon (Aug. 1-3, in Edale, in the stunning Lake District). It sounds amazing – kind of like a Grateful Dead concert crossed with a wood-carving festival. I want to go, but alas, my caravan won’t make it across the pond this year.
“The Spoon, the Bowl and the Knife,” a documentary film about Swedish carving legend Wille Sunqvist, is now available (in the United States from Country Workshops and Pinewood Forge).
Wille’s book “Swedish Carving Techniques” (Taunton) is back in print, and available, as they say, wherever books are sold.
I’m convinced spoon carving is the “Roubo Workbench” of the next couple years…and spoons are a far less expensive and time-consuming to make than a bench. Plus, you can work with “found wood” (preferably green) and it takes only a few tools.
You’ll be learning more about spoon carving in the August issue of Popular Woodworking Magazine in an article from Peter Follansbee (who learned the craft from Wille and his son, Jogge, and Drew Langser). (And Drew will be at Woodworking in America 2014, to talk about how he sharpens tools for green woodworking, including the knives he uses for spoon carving, among other things.) I have and use one of Peter’s spoons, and gave another to my step-father at Christmas – they are lovely things; far nicer to look at and use than the soulless versions that come in a three-pack at the grocery.
Read this preview on Joiner’s Notes of what you’ll discover from Peter’s article (it includes the picture above, which I, er, borrowed from him) – and get a head start by collecting suitable sticks from your local forest (or your backyard).
p.s. Subscribe now to get the August issue.
