What is Wood Turning?
Wood turning is a traditional method of shaping wood, taking a roughly shaped piece of wood and making it round - adding in various rounded decorations along the way. Think of a round chair leg - it isn't necessarily one fixed diameter along it's length, it might flare out along it's length etc. Chances are that it has been turned on a wood turning lathe.
Wood turning is hugely versatile - think of anything that is round in shape and it might have been made on some kind of lathe - wooden plates/bowls, rolling pins, chair legs, children's toys, the list is long. According to some reports, the first known wood turning was done by the Egyptian's in 300BC, using a pole lathe (lathe that uses human power to turn the wood).
How does it work?
The lathe holds the timber, and spins it around. The wood turner then uses various tools such as gouges, which are guided by their hands, with the tool on a rest, to shape the wood into the desired shape. It takes considerable skill to chose the right tools, and to guide those tools in the right way to cut the right bits off the wood, and to get a smooth acceptable finish.
This is working by hand - a lathe may have a motor to spin the wood, but for me, it is my skill and judgement that forms the item - a bowl, for example.
How do I apply this to my practice?
Due to my long term physical health conditions, I sit at my lathe - this is contrary to normal practice where people usually stand.
Sitting is much more challenging as we need to move our bodies around the wood to shape it - and sitting restricts that. Furthermore, we get strength to resist the tools by our standing stance - something which is much harder to do when sitting. Sitting isn't recommended unless you know what you are doing. But through a lot of experimenting and practice, it works for me.
I only produce items up to a certain size this way, but that isn't a problem.
Traditional Skills
Traditional craftsman tools and skills are important to me too - I don't have a lot of fancy tools, or many powered tools - I have a few good tools that I know how to use, and use them.
Due to my conditions, I work in a quiet dust free environment - I have dust allergies, and an aversion to noise. I listen to Radio 3 on some lower powered speakers whilst I work - if I can't hear the radio, something is wrong.
