Made to Order...Finding True Talent!

Don't you just love and admire great talent? Aren't you awed by people that have imaginative ideas that they can bring to life? Talent can take several forms: those that can come up with the great idea, but can't build it; those that can build it but can't come up with the idea; and that very rare person who can come up with the idea and build it! That unique person we normally call an "artist." Think Michelangelo...

Take this humidor for instance: the guy that built this was in his late 30's when he made it. Thought up the concept and made it with his own two hands. The box is made of seven exotic woods, all inlayed carefully on to the main frame of the humidor. How in the world did he do that? Dallas based Paul Labadie is probably one of the most talented guys I know! He is also responsible for coming up with our company jobsite signs and our logo (up in the corner of our blog), both modeled after an old wood block stamp. Paul represents the whole package - great ideas that he builds himself!



My youngest child Whitney has introduced me to some absolutely incredible blogs.  The twin sisters, Erika McPherson and Darby Stickler whom I mentioned in an earlier blog have Urban Grace Interiors and "fly through our window" respectively - both of which have wonderful ideas! Their creativity is refreshing. I have spent way too much time trying to figure out how so much talent is concentrated in one family... Apparently Erika is working on some interiors with a local Plano talent Catherine Clay because she links to her site CatherineClayPhotography. I just couldn't resist the temptation to see who Erika was shadowing so I too went to the website. In a different venue than the world I normally work in, Catherine is one of the more talented photographers I have ever seen. Since these ladies can both conceive of the idea and get them produced, does that make them artists?

Some people have the talent to recognize and create wonderful ideas but choose not to use their talents to produce them. Ah...we normally call them Architects! Most of the work you have seen throughout this blog has been designed by one of four enormously talented architects - Robbie Fusch, Richard Drummond Davis, Paul Turney and Wilson Fuqua. With an extreme eye for detail and a tremendous sense of creativity, their work stands out in the architectural community. Beside that, they are really nice guys!

The craftsmen we work with the most are the ones that take the wonderful designs of these great architects and others and make them come to life. Normally they do not have the ability to conceive of the wonderful idea or design, but they sure know how to work with their hands to get the idea built!

In the old style of building from hundreds of years ago here is a post and beam timberframe under construction. The walls are literally formed out of timber. We have Denshield vapor barrier installed in the middle of the timber to prevent moisture transfer to the inside of the structure.

Finished, the pool cabana turned out looking like this. Note the split brick nogging laid in a herringbone pattern in between the timber verticals. The same splits are on the inside so you have back to back herringbone patterns with a moisture barrier in between. Now that is real talent!

Truly talented people who are architecturally correct with period authenticity (and a budget that allows for their efforts!) come up with wonderful designs that talented genius' who work with their hands then build.

This walnut bar picks up the cross buck design of the floor.  The curved front corner of the cabinet requires a specially talented hand to make it look right! The handmade leaded glass panels were actually conceived by the interior designer and produced by yet another set of talented artisans.

Finding true talent is not easy. Through the years many have thought that they can design and/or build wonderfully detailed and intricate plans but missed the mark with the finished product. Something pleasing to the eye ends up being the custody of the beholder. Recognizing God's gift of talent and applying it in your chosen craft kind of makes your heart sing!

Trash or Treasure?

If the SPCA had a profile for their "perfect" adopting family, we most probably would be at the top of their list. Molly and I love strays! Furniture that is... We have furnished our home with a wide variety of castoffs, rescued from the jaws of death and given a facelift for continued use. Oh, we have the resources to go buy an entire home of new furniture if we wanted to. But we would lose the sense of family that typically goes with re-using old (and re-built) furnishings. Often we have spent more by being socially conscious and re-furbishing old pieces. We just like the look and durability of old furniture!

This mantle came out of Molly's father's old childhood home in Bernice, Louisiana. When we received it it was covered with years of old sooted varnish. Because it was virtually black I told Molly that it was going straight to the trash dump... Wrong! After Thanksgiving dinner one year I wandered out to my workshop (under my father-in-law's watchful eye!) just to see if it would clean up. With a little Klean Strip Stripper, some single "0" steel wool, and a little elbow grease this absolutely gorgeous oak mantle came back to life! I used a Minwax wax finish to complete the process. We have enjoyed the mantle every day we have been in our home.

Before Shelby came along Molly was in complete denial about having a baby. So much in denial that she had me do the entire first nursery (that will NEVER happen again!). Anyway, I bought this crib which started life with slats on both headboard and footboard. After our kids grew out of it, that crib took up almost permanent residency in our attic - until grandbaby #1 came along. Thinking that we would get something completely new to spoil all grandkids rotten I suggested that we clean out the attic and get rid of the baby bed. Wrong again! Molly had my trim crew remove the old slats from the ends of the bed and add panels. Once completed she hired Debbie Cole of La Foofaraw in Plano to dress up what used to be a very boring blond baby bed. As you can see, Debbie did a phenomenal job!

Shortly after we married Molly and I were in Monroe, Louisiana visiting family when we happened in to a wonderful antique store. This table caught our eye. We bought it and used it for many years with the old carmel finish that was original to the piece. The table was incredibly well built but really did not go in our new home. Molly loves black and white! So I stole a page out of our painter's book and used a finish that we have done in many of our homes.  First, I stripped the table. Because the stain was so well impregnated into the old wood I did not need to stain the table again and could proceed to the next step which was to paint the table with Sherwin Williams flat latex black paint. Once dry I then sanded that amount of stain that I wanted to show through the finished product. After cleaning up the dust I coated it with Dura Seal Polyurethane - a product we typically will use on floors. I like how thin it goes on and how evenly it dries.  Two coats later we have a beautiful finish that wears like iron!

When we talk about "rescued from the jaws of death" we really mean RESCUED! This walnut armoire now sits in our bedroom, the top crown after having been used at one point as a chicken feeding trough! We found it way in the back of an antique store (where all the really good stuff is!). I think I paid $400 for it maybe fifteen years ago. Same program as we detailed above, a lot of love and a ton of elbow grease makes things clean up pretty well!

This is next... Molly told me to take her old "hope chest" from when she was a girl to the Goodwill. I saw it as a toy chest for the newly completed Playroom that was detailed a few blogs ago. As this is being written the chest sits on my work bench partially stripped. At some point we will try to show the progression to completion.

Look around - I bet you have things which could be re-used. Each has a story: all will continue to bring you pleasure if you will rescue them!

Parts and Pieces....

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I didn't start out wanting to build really big, really fine homes...it just sort of happened.  My uncle had an old Chris Craft cabin cruiser boat which I truly loved.  Probably that influence led to building some real simple (and poorly constructed) toy boats down in the basement of our home in Illinois.  I was probably six or eight.  The "bug" bit pretty hard and before I knew it I was carving, in a rough sort of way, gun stocks for the other kids in the neighborhood.  Early attempts at staining the gun stocks was a real mess, but the guns were better than anything else we could get our hands on!

Next was the lathe.  The same uncle that had the neat cabin cruiser had this wonderful lathe he taught me how to use.  You guessed it - I talked my parents into buying me a brand new Sears lathe for Christmas.  The bowl and the candlestick to the right were both done when I was around fourteen.

Basketball intervened in this apprentice cabinetmaker's life. When you are 6' 4" and not yet driving the coaches have a few things to say about where you will be spending your time.  Though sidetracked, I never got over my love for working with my hands.  In shop class I built a maple step stool, dry sink and large swivel mirror.  The quality was improving but still not up to my expectations.

Growing to 6' 8" meant that my love of wood was going to be directed towards the hardwoods of a basketball floor at least through the end of high school and maybe into college.  Not much production out of the 'ole woodshop happened because of a nice career in college basketball.  But I never lost my love for working with wood!

Right out of college I married Molly - the love of my life, who inherited a rather large woodchuck. She knew woodworking was part of the package and her family asked my father and me to produce three large wooden fountains, and a number of French flower boxes for our wedding reception. Big weddings in small towns take on an extravagance all their own.  Ours was no exception.  The fountains were probably eight feet across and fully functioning.

Once Molly learned that I was reasonably handy she began to ask me to make things.  This check-out desk for her store was no exception.  She may be the most creative person I know, and she knew exactly what to tell me to build to serve her customers.




My workshop is my retreat.  Often after I work all day out with the guys on the jobsite I will end up in the Garage building or re-finishing something.  Here are a couple of recent works.  Both of my daughters liked the black hutch so well that they each asked for a smaller, entertainment center version.  One sits in Whitney and Max's home in Dallas; one sits in Shelby and Jake's home in San Diego.






This actually was my second attempt at Garden gates (there is a set of two).  The first ones were made out of oak but I forgot to take into account that the center core of the gate would swell when wet!  How depressing to work so hard on something only to have it swell and break apart!  We got it right the second time.

Below, furniture you can live in.  A lifelong love of cabinetry and craftsmanship evolved into wonderful projects like this.  No, we don't build this out in the Garage - it takes a little more space!