The Green Man

I was asked to carve a green man and took the task on. This post shows the carving off and gives the prospective purchaser a close look at the carving before committing to buy through the Folksy Shop.

He is carved from Cedar which is still quite green. This means it will split on the ends and may split across the face. Personally I wish I could get more carvings to split as it lends something magical to them, just look at the Merlin carving on my blog and tell me thats not wonderful, because of the splits in the face! Wood is a living thing and the face of this green man will darken, the contrast between the whiter sap wood and the darker, redder, heart wood will become more pronounced.

Wood will move and breath and as it slowly dries it settles into something quite unique.

He is a wall hanging piece that will hang straight from a nail, or he can stand on his own. He is finished in Danish oil and stands 9 1/2 inches tall. The diameter of the wood is approx 3 inches. The width of the carving is just under 3 inches and the length of the face is 6 inches. The next photo gives some scale. It was taken before the carving was completed.

Here are a few more shots

The end grain at the top and bottom have been 'burnt sealed' and oiled. The design was burnt into the wood with a pyrography iron. The top and bottom are the same design just slightly differently placed. I do this because I feel the wood left natural makes the whole carving look unfinished.

I hope you like him, he's quite tactile, the cedar has finished so smooth and waxy it's lovely to touch. I may hang him in my kitchen for a while :) This has been carved completely by hand using carving palm chisels and knives. The wood is reclaimed or gifted wood, that would end up on the fire or thrown away, so no tree is wantonly hurt in the making. This branch was given to me by my parents neighbour after pruning his cedar tree this year.

If he was to appear in the shop I guess I would price him at £38.99 plus postage of £5.00 (he weighs 900g) This carving took over 10 hours from blank log to carved, burnt and oiled.

However I'm on holiday for a week so he won't be appearing in the shop until the 30th October.

As always your comments and thoughts are welcome.

~ Dave ~

When a stick becomes something more

The stick in question is the favourite stick of a certain Barnaby Ray. He has been playing with it as a 'stick' for a while now. He then asked me to carve a face on it, this is the result.

The stick is about 1/2" in diameter and this next shot shows the face with more scale

Finished in vegetable oil so that my pal Barnaby doesn't get Poorly from chemical finishes. It also has his name and some patterns burnt into the area above the handle.

This is now the Warlock Wand and Barnaby's dad has been turned into a frog numerous times.

The next wand is for Barny's sister Florence Ray. She wanted an angel which as followers may know is not something I do!

As the photo shows this carving has a "beautiful" angelic face (beauty is in the eye of the beholder, if Florence likes it that's good enough for me).

The wand has the usual Futhark Runes burnt into the wood with Florence's name at the top.

I tried to do wings coming from behind the face and with the thickness of the wood the end result was ok.

The photo above shows the back of the carving. Again finished in olive oil for safety and delivered to, I hope, a happy little girl.

Quite a departure from the usual, but something my own son has got excited about; my order book has increased by 1, soon to be 2, unfortunately your own children don't tend to be paying customers :)

Your comments as always are welcome.

~ Dave ~