Wooden cups

Wooden cups, made by hand tools only, these cups are also known by some as kuksas. Each kuksa is made from one piece of wood, and most of the samples here are apple, with two of them made from Sika spruce.




The cup at 3 o`clock was the first one I made (it is also shown in the last image at the bottom of the page). It has gone very much darker with use and was made just under a year ago. I frequently for water, juice, and alcohol. I dried it out a bit to quickly and some splits appeared in the main body of the cup and these open and close depending on how hot it is. These splits do not go all the way through. These cups are not made from burr as is traditional, but from larger branch-wood. Burr wood is far more durable and apparently more waterproof. I soak these in hot beeswax to waterproof. As these are waxed they can not be used for hot drinks or wax melts; to use them untreated they do slowly leak, which was not a problem in the past with outdoor living or with stone and mud floors.



The top left cup is made from burr sitka spruce, and came from a log that was 14 inch dia and only 9 inches thick. This log was in a pile in the woods for about a year.




My first wooden cup, as new. They acquire a patina and darken very quickly.


The bench I now make the cups on: note the French clog-makers tool, that I have found to be very useful for hollowing out. I use an adze and then long bent and spoon bent gouges to hollow out the bowl finishing up with a small hook knife. I will be making long handled hook knives as these are so much easier and quicker to use.

Magpie

A few pictures of a magpie

I have used light fast wood dyes to stain the wood.This design is far more complicated to make, because of the long tail feathers.

Fan birds, the Raven

The raven and my fan bird making bench.
















The raven - the first fan bird that I designed and made to represent a particular species of bird. All the birds I have made so far have been a stylized representation of a generic bird. I like ravens, very intelligent birds, like most of the crow family. A bird for this time of year with Halloween coming up soon. Made in the same way as any other fan birds, but with a bigger belly and a big beak, and then stained black.




















It is very easy to get into a rut and just make what you usually make. Changing a design can result in failures and potentially wasted time, it is easier to make what you know.
This raven is hopefully just the start of many different bird designs.

















As I said in my last post, I played around with some beech, and the wing tips had this lovely graceful curve. What I did not say was that I found another piece of beech at the Cranbourne Chase Wood Fair and tried to make another one with the same effect, as a public demonstration. Everything was going really well until I started the final thinning of the hinge, and the fanning out of the feathers. They started falling out, and by the time I had completed the interlocking of the feathers I only had half of them left. I gave the bird a small shake and the remaining interlocked feathers came loose. I was left holding a birds body, a complete failure and in front of 20 people as well.
As I explained to my audience it was not a total failure, such failures often hold a few lessons. The beech I used previously was green but had been cut down and left for some time. The beech I had used in my demonstration was very green and had been cut recently. The conclusion is that beech needs to mellow before making fan birds, just like hazel hurdle makers do with their hazel, they cut it in the winter and leave it for a least six weeks before using it, as it splits and works better after it has stood for a bit. I have also always found that beech does not split straight and tends to run off. I have never used that much beech in my career and I am not an expert on it like oak and ash. Is it me or is beech a bit of a sod to split straight?



















I have stopped using a shaving horse on which to carve my birds and have made a dedicated bench. It is essentially a post vice that stands up on its own owing to the fact it was made from an ash tree trunk that split into 3 branches. I used a single vice screw and some 3 x 4 inch sections of dried oak beam I have lying about the workshop. All my tools are to hand, hanging off pegs or slotted into holes drilled into the bench.



















Seen above is another use for this bench, and it is to make kuksas. I am using a French clog makers hook knife to cut out the inside of the bowl. The great thing is that I can walk all around the bench. I am sure I will find many other uses for this bench in time.