Man crafting

Here, finished and installed, resplendent against freshly painted walls, is my Christmas present from Mr Woollydaze.

Doesn’t they look fantastic! I had a very specific idea about how I wanted these shelves to look: thick, rustic and (this was the difficult bit) with a ‘natural’ edge.

I think my brief provided Mr Woollydaze with quite a challenge. As most wood that’s sold to the general public is tidied and sawn, he had to go back one step. He phoned around sawmills as far away as Wales before finding one just a few miles from home that could provide what was needed. Apparently when the lengths of wood arrived on the farm, they looked like bits of tree. Sadly he didn’t take any photos so I’m not able to appreciate how scary this must have been.

After some drying out, sanding down and staining up, they were presented to me on Christmas Day. I was able to choose what order to put them in and on which side, and my wishes were carried out. Now, rather than having a pile of books next to/under my bed which have been borrowed and need to be read and returned, they are displayed and tidy. Mr Woollydaze has a ‘matching’ set of shelves on his side of the bed, but fewer book to put on them.

 

The shelves are exactly what I had imagined and exactly what I wanted, and full credit to Mr Woollydaze for bringing to life what was in my head. In many ways I think what he has achieved here is a lot more artistic that what I do when I craft: I take patterns where the finished result is pictured and work through the instructions to recreate that. This took a lot more thought and ingenuity.

As a result of his success, Mr Woollydaze has been commissioned to build the shelves for the newly redecorated lounge. The brief is similar: chunky and built to fit, but this time without the natural edge. Not to make things too easy, this time it’s a ‘sail shelf’ where the shelves get gradually narrower. There is already talk of having to reinforce the floor to support it. The wood has arrived, has been stained and is in the hallway waiting… no doubt soon a magical tranformation will occur.

Note: all the photos in this blog post were taken by my father-in-law, since neither my camera nor I were up to the job of taking decent photos in the current murky weather. Even the photos on the shelf were taken by my father-in-law. It’s great having a professional photographer in the family.

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