There are many kinds of wood available on the market today, more accessible to us than ever. Many exotics are available to us in our woodworking stores, babuniga, leopardwood, xxx, etc. Not only does buying these kinds of wood encourage the saw cutting of stands of trees from rainforests, savannahs etc, there is a significant amount of energy used to transport this wood from the far reaches of the world. We live in a time when transporting goods from the all over the world is not only possible, but also standard. But just because we can transport them this far, doesn’t necessarily mean we should. These woods are cut down, and transported by truck and ship hundreds of miles to our door, burning massive amounts of diesel fuel on the way, depleting our dwindling oil supply and exhausting noxious and toxic fumes into our sky, adding to the greenhouse effect. There is a strong grassroots movement to shop locally for food and materials in America. We should consider joining this fight as woodworkers by buying our wood locally as well. There are several reasons why this is advantageous. First, the amount of fuel used to transport wood harvested locally is significantly reduced. A typical ocean freight boat uses xxx gallons of fuel to bring its payload from x to x. Most locally grown and harvested trees are obtained from within an x mile radius, and would thus be using only x gallons of fuel to bring the trees to the lumberyard, and another x gallons to deliver that to the local store. A fuel savings of x gallons.
Second, and perhaps most importantly, locally grown and harvested lumber is visible. When we purchase bubinga, we can’t drive out to the area its being harvested from and see that it’s being harvested responsibly. We cant see if they are clear cutting vast land tracks, if the rivers and lakes are being washed full of sediment from erosion. We have no way to know the impacts of our demand. But locally grown and harvested wood comes from our neighborhoods, where they are not only visible to us, but fall under the rules and regulations of our local municipalities and governments, who have been tasked with the public mandate to protect our forests, streams, and environments. Trees harvested abroad are often located in countries with either corrupt governments that take payoffs to overlook ecologically destructive harvesting techniques, or governments without adequate provision of power and regulations to enforce such restriction and governance.
Third, there is an honesty of materials buy using something that grows near us. When someone looks at a box we create from local wood, we can point out our backdoor and say, that is the kind of tree this comes from. We can get to know our material more personally, no longer is it just a piece of colored material, it’s a kind of tree we know intimately in all of its many faces. How the leaves look, what kind of fruit it makes, what the branches look like in winter. This helps us no longer look at the wood as material, but as a living and growing creature that in its season can be cut and shaped into something we know intimately. Beyond this, it gives our projects honesty. In our ever-oversimplified world, there is a quickly reducing sense of regionalism. Every place looks the same as the next place, wherever you go. The fast food store in Maine is the same as the store in California, Sweden or China. Do we want this same kind of uniform blandness in our own work? Hopefully, your thoughts on this is no. What makes going to Denver special? All the woodwork done using the local Western Red Cedar and xxx. In Maine, you see the inclusion of white birch and sugar maple in the woodwork. These differences not only are ecologically responsible, they give a sense of place to the pieces we create. And in America, the strongest vote we can make is by what we do or don’t purchase. So find what grows locally, and work in that medium. The financial benefit to this is that wood that is local is often significantly more affordable. After all, a lot less has been spent in harvesting and delivering it to your door.
I live in North Carolina. I also harvest a lot of my own lumber, so by this virtue, I am sure that the lumber I use is local. However, if I didn’t, a quick call to your local hardwood lumberyard, or a well-informed woodworking store, and they should be able to tell you where your wood is coming from. Here in North Carolina, most of the wood available to me is Walnut, Black Cherry, Rock Maple, Hickory. Sometimes, fruitwood is also available, the best among these being Pear. There are so many combinations of wood, color and texture in these woods; I could work a lifetime with just these alone.
Although you see a lot of woodwork with leopardwood, babuing, and other exotics, these woods have traveled a very long way, burning a lot of fuel and resources to be available to us in North America. These woods are beautiful, and this cannot be doubted. But the domestic hardwoods of North America are often unduly underrated, and should be more widely used. It only makes sense for us that live here to make art with the wood of our local land. We don’t build igloos here, don’t buy exotic woods. Combinations of cherry with walnut, maple with cherry, hickory with walnut, can give very exciting color patterns, all with wood from the local soils of our homeland.
Second, and perhaps most importantly, locally grown and harvested lumber is visible. When we purchase bubinga, we can’t drive out to the area its being harvested from and see that it’s being harvested responsibly. We cant see if they are clear cutting vast land tracks, if the rivers and lakes are being washed full of sediment from erosion. We have no way to know the impacts of our demand. But locally grown and harvested wood comes from our neighborhoods, where they are not only visible to us, but fall under the rules and regulations of our local municipalities and governments, who have been tasked with the public mandate to protect our forests, streams, and environments. Trees harvested abroad are often located in countries with either corrupt governments that take payoffs to overlook ecologically destructive harvesting techniques, or governments without adequate provision of power and regulations to enforce such restriction and governance.
Third, there is an honesty of materials buy using something that grows near us. When someone looks at a box we create from local wood, we can point out our backdoor and say, that is the kind of tree this comes from. We can get to know our material more personally, no longer is it just a piece of colored material, it’s a kind of tree we know intimately in all of its many faces. How the leaves look, what kind of fruit it makes, what the branches look like in winter. This helps us no longer look at the wood as material, but as a living and growing creature that in its season can be cut and shaped into something we know intimately. Beyond this, it gives our projects honesty. In our ever-oversimplified world, there is a quickly reducing sense of regionalism. Every place looks the same as the next place, wherever you go. The fast food store in Maine is the same as the store in California, Sweden or China. Do we want this same kind of uniform blandness in our own work? Hopefully, your thoughts on this is no. What makes going to Denver special? All the woodwork done using the local Western Red Cedar and xxx. In Maine, you see the inclusion of white birch and sugar maple in the woodwork. These differences not only are ecologically responsible, they give a sense of place to the pieces we create. And in America, the strongest vote we can make is by what we do or don’t purchase. So find what grows locally, and work in that medium. The financial benefit to this is that wood that is local is often significantly more affordable. After all, a lot less has been spent in harvesting and delivering it to your door.
I live in North Carolina. I also harvest a lot of my own lumber, so by this virtue, I am sure that the lumber I use is local. However, if I didn’t, a quick call to your local hardwood lumberyard, or a well-informed woodworking store, and they should be able to tell you where your wood is coming from. Here in North Carolina, most of the wood available to me is Walnut, Black Cherry, Rock Maple, Hickory. Sometimes, fruitwood is also available, the best among these being Pear. There are so many combinations of wood, color and texture in these woods; I could work a lifetime with just these alone.
Although you see a lot of woodwork with leopardwood, babuing, and other exotics, these woods have traveled a very long way, burning a lot of fuel and resources to be available to us in North America. These woods are beautiful, and this cannot be doubted. But the domestic hardwoods of North America are often unduly underrated, and should be more widely used. It only makes sense for us that live here to make art with the wood of our local land. We don’t build igloos here, don’t buy exotic woods. Combinations of cherry with walnut, maple with cherry, hickory with walnut, can give very exciting color patterns, all with wood from the local soils of our homeland.
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