I found this piece of black walnut while visiting a friends shop. He had it in his burn pile and I saw its uniqueness so I grabbed it. The tree had sustained damage, most likely due to wind, and had split perfectly along a grain line. So you can see the tree from the inside out, which truly a rare occurrence. I have both sides of the split.
I knew I wanted to make a receptacle of some sort out of this and the idea gelled pretty quickly. Take a section of the board, add some angled facets, and suspend it between metal legs. I wanted it to be clean and modern, so a monolithic design was selected. I wanted to do brass, as it's on trend and polishes up with relative ease. I knocked the walnut out pretty quickly, however the brass was put on hold due to cost. The piece got packed away and forgot about for about 18 months when I stumbled on it. I was in a better spot, so I ordered up the brass bar stock. However, having never worked with brass I let it sit for another 6 months or so. I was scared of screwing up my pricey metal. Then one day out of the blue I said to myself "**** it, if I screw it up, I screw it up. It's not going to make itself". So I cut the brass (cuts like butter, so nice). And went to polishing it up. About half way through one of the legs got caught in the buffing wheel and thrown to the concrete. One corner took most of the damage, however I was able to start again and get it squared and polished up.
So here it is after two years since its inception, my brass and black walnut valet (or candy dish). So rewarding to finish my own piece out. Just make what you envision and don't be scared to screw up, that's the only way you learn.
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