Serengeti
27" x 12" $5500 Currently Not For Sale
The "Serengeti” piece began as a couple chunks of Zebrawood end grain. Like most of the wood I use in Wall Art it was cut offs from a local company that makes furniture. The patterns were very interesting reminding me of trees and at the same time electrical signals. As usual interesting end grain often is very unstable wood. Once I knew what I wanted the Zebrawood to look like the process to get it there and still have my fingers started. I began by gluing the end pieces together so I could resaw them to thinner pieces to get the width I was looking for. This worked until it didn't and some of the uncooperative pieces started breaking apart while resawing. I had to keep reassembling the end pieces and attempting to keep resawing them. I eventually got the pieces that I was looking for and once again had to re-assemble and glue them. The pieces were very fragile so it was a combination of planing and sanding that got them to a uniform thickness. The patterns held together but none of the pieces were square. That would have to wait until the end assembly.
The frame is figured Maple with an outside and inside band of Peruvian Walnut for an accent. To add depth to the finished piece the frame is also beveled at about 5º. I finished the frame before assembling the Zebrawood pattern since I had to commit to something being square. Once the frame was completed the interesting part started. The were many fractures in the Zebrawood pieces since it started as very fractured end cuts. The squaring and pattern matching was finally done with tape, a very sharp plane and a straight edge. I would squeeze the individual pieces together and tape one side to try and hold it together while I tried to get a square edge on it. As shown above it eventually worked out.
The frame is figured Maple with an outside and inside band of Peruvian Walnut for an accent. To add depth to the finished piece the frame is also beveled at about 5º. I finished the frame before assembling the Zebrawood pattern since I had to commit to something being square. Once the frame was completed the interesting part started. The were many fractures in the Zebrawood pieces since it started as very fractured end cuts. The squaring and pattern matching was finally done with tape, a very sharp plane and a straight edge. I would squeeze the individual pieces together and tape one side to try and hold it together while I tried to get a square edge on it. As shown above it eventually worked out.
