From an early age I was always the kid who sees things differently. Literally. The kid who could draw, who could easily imagine objects in three dimensions, who could tell you whether a picture on the wall was leaning just a hair to one side, whether a square is actually square, whether parallel lines are truly parallel. My eyes and my mind have always been very keen to spatial relationships. I can even tell you how much you weigh, within two or three pounds, just by looking at you.
So furniture making is a very natural thing for me. I can imagine it in every dimension and in great detail before I even build it, I can tell you how long or wide or thick a piece of wood is without using a tape measure, I can see quickly whether or not edges are square or sides parallel to each other. So making furniture out of wood feels like what I was made to do.
Because I am so innately perceptive about physical spatial relationships, as I move through the world my mind is constantly making subconscious judgments about designs and proportions and the visual and emotional effect these things have. A lifetime of absorbing and processing the world is what has given me my artistic voice. I have a style, or at least I hope I do, that is not lifted from anyone or any tradition, but rather comes from deep within my brain. When I design I simply draw the thing until it looks just right, until the proportions and the lines and the relationships all look right and pleasing, then I stop. I am not overly educated about design, even furniture design. I simply follow my instincts.
I’ve been very lucky so far in that some people have seen beauty in the things I make, and so I continue to be busy designing and building furniture. It took a while to get here, but I think I’m finally in a place where I am free to follow my own creative feelings rather than a path that’s already been taken.
I think my style is a reflection of my soul, or at least what I want my soul to be someday. Deep within I seek peace and simplicity. Above all, I seek to be grounded and solid unfettered by flashy details. And so this is how I design.
I like working with Cecilia and Fe29 for the simple reason that it stretches me. I become familiar with the habits and spirits of other artists and I learn a great deal from them. I encounter other materials and methods and am fascinated by the ways other artists achieve the things they do. But most of all I am stretched on the inside, almost forced to use a completely different part of my creative mind in order to imagine something that fits and flows well with the work of others. And it’s always a very satisfying feeling to stand back and look and realize that the thing we just finished is far greater than the sum of its parts. That moment always makes me believe that there is more to this life than what we see.