SUNSET MAGAZINE, JULY 2000 Best of the West

Redwood Reborn: Recycling An Emblem of the West

By Peter O. Whiteley (view original article)

You might not give a second glance to a dilapidated barn, a rickety train trestle, or a collapsing wine vat, but to craftsmen like Whit McLeod, Tom Schot, Brad Wilson, and Garth Miller, they're things of hidden beauty. These Northern California woodworkers know that many such structures are made of old-growth redwoods felled decades ago; 1/8 inch below the weathered surface are the same rich, warm tones and tight grain the wood exhibited the day it was milled. McLeod and his fellow crafters recycle redwood (or, in some cases, Douglas fir, cedar, and oak) into furniture, much of it intended for outdoor use. Their quiet but powerful philosophy is, No standing trees will be harvested for our products.

Redwood, the most Western, revered, and protected of these woods, is particularly appropriate for outdoor furniture because of its resistance to rot and termites. And as the woodworking treasure-hunters know, old-growth wood has a handsomeness unequaled by more recently harvested lumber. Turned into tables, chairs, or benches and protected with penetrating oil finishes, what was landfill-bound wood can return outdoors, an example of natural elegance and renewed life.

McLeod crafted the sturdy flat-arm bench above below from a stash of redwood posts and beams that once framed a barn built in the late 1800s. The design of the 60-inch-long bench echoes the Craftsman style of the early 1900s. It is constructed using wedged mortise-and-tenon joinery, and the seat planks are slightly rounded, which adds comfort and also helps shed water. The suggested retail price is $1,040, plus shipping. Prices for other woodworkers' pieces, which range from traditional styles such as Adirondack chairs to concrete-topped contemporary tables, run from $69 to $2,700.

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