Crafting the Spoon

I have been working on the spoon bowls and have roughed them out to almost their final look. The first pic shows the front view and the second shows the back.

I am a firm believer that a good lovespoon must have a really well carved bowl. My research through the museums of Wales has shown me that in the olden days, a great deal of effort was put into the bowls, no matter how adept or crude the carver. When you stop to consider the rather meager tools that many of these young men would have had access to, some of their work borders on miraculous.

Many of the spoons I see for sale on the 'gift shop' type lovespoon sites suffer from extremely poorly designed and carved bowls. In many it appears the bowl was just an afterthought which was only grudgingly included so that the piece of wood is recognizable as a spoon. I think this is a great shame as the bowl lends a quiet dignity to the proceedings. Lovespoons are busy and vibrant things with the handles often being a veritable riot of activity. An elegant bowl acts as a real visual anchor and can have a quieting effect on the overall design. It also is a real measure of a carver's skill to get it even and fair with the right 'look'. I spend a good deal of time fussing with the bowl and I honestly believe that the effort I put in on an easily overlooked detail pays big dividends at the end of the job.

But that is enough sermonizing (is that a word?...it is now) for one day. I just hope that you'll agree with me that so far this double bowl has a very romantic feel to it and that it is doing a good job symbolizing 'union'.

Thank you for dropping by to see how things are progressing! I hope that you will be inspired to join our efforts to initiate an Eisteddfod in Portland and I look forward to reading your comments.

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David Western's Portland Eisteddfod Lovespoon

After a rather frustrating 'down time' due to a computer virus, I've got my photo file back and can resume spoon blog entries!

I've now glued a photocopy of the spoon design to the wood and have roughed out the overall shape of the spoon with a scroll saw. Unfortunately, you can't see much yet as all the good stuff is hidden under a layer of paper. But for me, I can see the wood left behind and I have a good idea of what awaits me when I start carving! When I flip the piece over, the proportions seem right and I am confident that the various vagaries of the wood grain will line up where I want them.

The second picture is a close-up showing an old dowel which must have linked the panel this spoon was cut from to another in bygone days. The dowel won't be seen when viewing the final product from straight-on but it will be visible on the side view. I have decided not to bother trying to remove it and repatching it with a walnut plug though. This old dowel's inclusion in the spoon won't do any harm structurally or visually, but it will lend some quirky charm and will be a good talking point! After all, how many people have a dowel which is potentially a hundred and fifty years old in their lovespoon!!