A local craftsman has made a niche for himself creating bespoke furniture and objects d’art
story and pictures stephen smith
Turning wood is a process of revealing the wood’s potential. You can’t force your will upon it – the wood knows what it wants to be.” With these words you begin to understand what kind of artist Dale Reece of Three Streams in the Assagay Valley is. His love and respect for his primary medium – wood – is obvious, and as you watch him work and see his creations, you begin to appreciate what he means.
He starts by selecting an interesting piece of wood, preferably from the crotch where two branches fork, and screwing it to his lathe – which spins at speeds of between 600 to 1 500 revolutions a minute. Then he slowly shaves away at the spinning wood using a variety of chisels until the desired shape is achieved. Wood turning is fascinating to watch – it’s the process of creation through elimination, the process of taking away the material that hides the piece of wood’s potential.
Dale has been turning wood and doing carpentry for 20 years, ever since he inherited his grandfather’s old lathe. That has since been retired and hidden away until Dale has enough workshop space to have it on the floor alongside his more modern lathe.
Recently branching out into metal work, Dale particularly enjoys using metal and wood together and has just finished a beautiful table – a complex cross section of a tree trunk that has been screwed to metal hairpin legs. “Using metal is such fun. If you need to add something, you just weld it in place and it’s done. It’s like a counterbalance to turning.”
As with his turning, Dale has managed to treat the wood with respect and emphasised its natural beauty. Dale is also all about responsible use of wood. The majority of the timber he uses is exotic and sourced mainly from tree fellers, art created from otherwise discarded trees such as jacaranda, camphor and liquid amber.
Each of Dale’s creations is unique and he particularly enjoys it when customers pop into his workshop to discuss the creation of one-off pieces that are exactly what they want.
072 601 6710
@3Streams