How we do things
So I have been doing armature wood working and general DIY projects for a long time now. My wife found one of my dream tools at a yard sale, a Shopsmith, and we picked it up. That tool, rather set of tools, was a kind of catalyst that culminated in events that lead us to setup shop here on Etsy.
A few years ago a friend at work told me about turning pens and that stuck in my head as something that might be fun. Well once we got the Shopsmith I though it would be a good type of project to do on it. It was also getting close to Christmas and we figured that handmade pens would make a great gift, and doing it ourselves would both save money and add that personal touch. The pens were a big hit.
We made some for ourselves and when I showed them off at work people started asking if I could make them some too ... so we did. Next thing you know someone told us about Etsy and now we are here.
The Shopsmith is a vintage model ER that was made and originally sold between 1948-1952. We do use modern chisels and finishing compounds / step. We use both natural and manmade material for our pens. When using wood we love it when we can use wood that we have personal gathered on vacation or around our property or family property in California. From friends and family we are able to get white tail deer antler, which turns out to be very popular. We also love the results when working with acrylic so we use that a lot too.
In the end we do this as a hobby and like most creative hobbies we can't keep everything we make so we figured we would give the world the opportunity to enjoy what we make.
