Apple wood is a very beautiful wood that is considered to be a hard wood but it is not as hard as cherry, maple or walnut.   Its rich color without distinct grain pattern makes it suitable to carve jewelry pieces.  Since the grain composition is very tight one can carve intricate details without those details crumbling, splitting or breaking at crucial design junctures.  The carvings depicted in the photo were carved between 1978 and 1981.  Each was carved with a knife while those with textured backgrounds were textured with an awl or ice pick kind of tool. Read the rest of this entry »

The carvings depicted in the photo trail are some of my earliest carvings carved between 1976 and 1979 while I was a member of the Mahoning Valley Wood Carvers of Warren, Ohio.  The club was founded in 1976 by about twenty carvers with the most notable being the late Huber King who had won Best of Show at the International Wood Carvers Congress, Davenport, Iowa several times in the late 70’s.  Read the rest of this entry »

Whittle Folk Gothic were carved around 1990 – 1991 and these five are all that remain from that era.   The inspiriation for these Whittle Folk Gothic came from the famous painting entitled “American Gothic” by Grant Wood.  Each was carved from a three quarter inch by at least three inches tall block of basswood and finished natural using Deft semi gloss clear wood finish (a brushing lacquer).  These “Gothic” figures were an attempt to carve realistic figures in a small scale of the whittle-carving style of carving only with a knife.  Read the rest of this entry »

WHITTLE FOLK ‘POKES are carvings done in a Western theme.  Each one, except for the miniature and the bust, were carved out of a three quarter inch square by four inch tall basswood block using only a knife and in particular just the tip end of the blade using a slicing cut. Read the rest of this entry »