About

Years ago, many years ago, I used to work in the tree care industry. I was fascinated by turned objects I would see in trade magazines such as Fine Woodworking. It was only a matter of time until I realized that I had access to a nearly endless supply of some of the best woods to turn on a lathe.

And turn I did, for about 15 years.

Life's responsibilities kept me from continuing, but my love of turning never left me.

Fast forward to a life that eventually landed me in Costa Rica. I could finally fill what I had always felt was an emptiness in my life, the need to create. Costa Rica offers a plethora of exotic woods and I thought that surely I had settled in woodturners heaven. Two thing I hadn't counted on were the climate and peoples' desire to get top dollar for anything they think someone else wants, regardless of the quality of that thing. Yes, there was wood to be had, but always at a premium price. Even if the wood was not premium wood.

So I bought wood. I quickly learned that to turn wood in this climate, one must own a kiln to dry that wood. The high humidity was literally raining on my parade. I tried. I really tried. I found that any wood I used, even supposedly "dry" wood would grow mold and get inundated with boring beetles that rendered my work useless. I also had to compete with a ton of turned bowls available in too many souvenir shops all over the country. Stuff that is mass produced or imported from China and sold as indigenous works. It just wasn't going to work.

Meanwhile, I had started a business in order to survive here. A business that served the tourists that flock to this area. This business unfortunately produced a lot of plastic waste, mostly in the form of used plastic bags whose end of life happened at my business. I spent a long time trying to figure out what to do with tens of thousands of used bags that nobody wanted.

Then I stumbled accross an organization called Precious Plastic that is dedicated to providing open source information about small scale recycling. They provide a ton of information and access to machines that are designed and fabricated in small shops all over the world. I also found a Youtube channel, Brothers Make run by two brothers in England that still give me inspiration and ideas. They are constantly pushing themselves to expand what is possible with "garbage".

So here I am, in a totally re-tooled workshop, making my own turning blanks from 100% recycled plastic. And I am loving it. I have been developing a process pretty much on my own since it appears there is nobody else doing what I am doing. At least nobody with a web presence. I guess I'll be that web presence and hopefully will inspire others to try this. So far, I have been developing my processes since 2021. I will do my best to describe them on the Process page. Bare with me, I'm busy.

Thanks for visiting and, of course, pura vida.