ThreeFrogStudios

ThreeFrogStudios is the latest step in my journey in handcraft.

First, I made wooden spoons because I like cooking with them. Then I began giving them to friends while working on new patterns. Then a few years ago I got a new space, built as a stable. I pitched the horse gear and put in a professional-grade table saw before the orgy of spending on a new house subsided and I would have second thoughts.
I sell locally in art/craft shows as well as through Etsy. Shows are hit or miss, but they often lead to commissions. I love working closely with customers to make exactly what they want and can't get in the mass market.

I make most of the lumber I use. Actually, that's how I got into this. 12 years ago, with my first-ever chainsaw, I felled a big tree that was dropping stuff all over the driveway and our cars. Logging and limbing it, i realized that it was really beautiful wood: dense, fine-grained, fragrant but not in a sticky sweet way, and a gorgeous orange-red color. I fell in love with cherry, and it is still my favorite. Now I scour the area, alert friends and neighbors so that no good tree that comes down in a storm is wasted. Once in a while I call my sawmill guys, who have decades of experience reading logs to get the best results.

Working with rough lumber, you try to maximize the character of each piece and waste nothing. Most "flaws" are really just outward signs of the tree's history and growth; each branch changes the trunk as it grows, making beautiful rings and maybe leaving a hole at the pith. As long these are not structural problems, I like to leave them. No commercial outfit would take the time for this.

I believe in using wood as it is; it respects the material. I don't like wood so "perfect" that you can't be sure right away whether it really is wood or some kind of cast resin. Real boards always have a B side, so on the back of a piece you may see "flaws."

Likewise, I'm not wild about staining wood so that it looks like something other than what it is, for instance maple with a "cherry" stain: why got just get cherry? The answer is usually commercial, and made by the manufacturer, not the buyer (maple is way cheaper than cherry). I even prefer finishes that change the color of the wood as little as possible, and I definitely prefer penetrating oil finishes over ones that form a plastic film over the wood grain– as long as the intended use allows it. But I'm not fanatical about this; in custom work the customer comes first.
Why Three Frog? I've always liked frogs; they make me smile. My house is surrounded by tree frogs in the spring, and the pond is a choral concert of green frogs and bullfrogs.