About Woodland Woodturning and Gaius Hanawalt
My first experience with woodworking was making slingshots from plywood scraps in my father’s workshop in the late 1950’s. An old lathe that had been in my family for several generations initiated my interest in woodturning. I eventually progressed to turning bowls and I especially enjoy segmented turning, and make bowls and vases. There is lots of room to play with colors and patterns, and the results can be stunning.
The tools and skills from my work as a toolmaker help tremendously when making segmented bowls. All dimensions are measured in thousands of an inch with micrometers or dial calipers.
Segmented bowls are made from small pieces of wood, with very accurate dimensions and angles that have been glued together into rings. The rings are stacked, glued together, and shaped and hollowed on a wood lathe using hand held tools. When the desired shape and thickness are acquired, the bowls are sanded to remove any imperfections, and hand rubbed with oil until the desired gloss is achieved. Some of these bowls take hundreds of hours from design to completion.
Our Family has made several trips to the southwest and many of my bowls were inspired by Native American pottery and baskets.
My cutting boards are made from both exotic and local woods. I have spent several years testing patterns to get the best 3-D effect possible from the woods I use. Most boards have two different illusions. I constantly change the design in an effort to enhance the visual quality of each board.
In the many years that have passed since my first plywood slingshot and my first turned lamp (from plywood) in the 50’s to the segmented and laminated bowls I produce today, I am still using one of the lathes and a few of the same tools passed to me from my great-grandfather when I was a young boy living in Altoona.
We are located in Northwest Central PA between State College and Dubois, PA
I currently do not have a gallery/showroom at my shop.
Gaius "Doc" Hanawalt