Wood Turning Bowls for a Gallery: Inside My Production Run

There is a new film up, and it is a rare one for me. A gallery in Farnham ordered three bowls, and an order for multiples pulls against every instinct I have, because I would far rather follow an idea than repeat one. That tension is really what the film is about.

The timber is Black Limba, which I had not worked with before. It is soft and quite porous to turn, and the colouring stopped me in my tracks. Pale brown and black stripes run through deep orange patches, and it is one of those species that reminds you why any of us bother.

When you are making more than one of anything, working in stages beats working piece by piece. I mounted each blank on a spike plate, shaped the outside and cut the sacrificial tenon on all three, then swapped to the chuck and did all three insides, then all the sanding, then all the finishing. It feels less creative written down like that. It is still the right way to do it.

Even wall thickness comes from a sweeping cut of the gouge right round the inside, from right to left, stopping every so often to check by feel rather than pressing on. Near the bottom I slow right down to match the feed rate, so the fibres do not tear and the finish stays clean without any argument with the sandpaper.

After power sanding through 120, 180, 240 and 400, the tenons came off in cole jaws, a Forstner bit cut a small recess for my maker's mark, and several coats of food-safe Danish oil went on over consecutive days so everything was properly cured before delivery.

I cannot pretend I enjoyed the repetition. There is real satisfaction in doing it properly, though, and the gallery were delighted, which settles the matter.