March 1, 2015 ITEM 91 300 YEAR OLD BENCH
I wrestled these two hardwood beams from a skip bin not too far from my house and carted them home on the roof of the trusty Subaru. A note here that if you ever decide to dabble in the high art of scavenging recyclable materials, I highly recommend acquiring a clapped out Subaru wagon with Rhino roof racks. There is not much I have not been able to easily shift around with this.
These beams were deceptively and enormously heavy and old by Aussi building standards. Coming from a renno of a big old Newtown terrace. I could guess that this is Eucalyptus that was hundreds of years old when it was cut and that was probably around 140 years ago. So lets say the tree this timber is from was a germinating seed around 300 years ago!!!!
Once home I determined the choice cuts to chop the beams down to more manageable size. The scraps made exceptional firewood for the BBQ. Then there was all the knocking off of trimming timber, sanding, de-nailing and so on just to get down to the great colour and character of this timber. The legs were cut out of the beam and the rest of the process of becoming a bench is apparent in the pictures. Basically I embarked on a bit of rebating and used a found broom handle to do the doweling to pin all the bits together. Another broom handle forms the red bracing detail under the seat. And a scrap bit of timber was used to fill a rebate on the surface where it is stamped.
Tags: Beach house sculpture, cafe furniture, carpentry, design, re-purpose, recycle, recycled sculpture, repurposed, street found, street found timber, streetwood, timber restoration, timber restored
- 7 comments
- Posted under Item, Wood
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Sarhn
said
Amazing to think that someone thought these beams worthless. It’s wonderful that people like you ‘see’ what others do not. I love the seat. 🙂
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liamnoble
said
Thanks, thats the kind of feedback we like around here. Have you had a skim back through some of the previous posts?
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liamnoble
said
Thanks champion, much appreciated 🙂
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Sarhn
said
Yes I had a look around. Some wonderful yet diverse items – furniture to bangles. Maybe a static picture gallery page might be an idea or even two. One being a record of all you have done and the other having photos of items that are for sale. Just a thought.
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liamnoble
said
Hi sarhn, not sure what you mean by static pic gallery? But keen to hear more😊
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Sarhn
said
Hi Liam, your ‘about’ is a static page i.e. always there. Maybe create another ‘always there’ page that shows a gallery of all you have done which you can update as you go along. Also a page of photos of items for sale. This would be easier for potential buyers to look through than having to look through all your past posts. Again just a thought.
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liamnoble
said
Awesome will see what I can put together. 🙂