Tea Scoops by Samorost

I made an exception. Normally I collect my wood myself in the forests or elsewhere in the landscape. Or someone gives me piece of wood or I recycle some old piece of wood I found somewhere. I don't buy it, I don't cut living trees. I wrote about the bog oak I received some time ago. It is local wood found by workers when doing some river regulation. My cousin salvaged some of it, some is still lying outside the workshop there. I already made one tea scoop from it, amazing wood. I wanted to learn more about it so I dig about it on the internet and found interesting page. Two cabinet makers from England are devoted to saving the remaining bog oaks in local fenlands. They are doing this for twenty years, they are doing great job. If you wanna learn more about this head to their webpage: http://www.adamsonandlow.com. I recommend it. So the point is that they sell small pieces online and I could not resist and bought two stunning pieces of their around 3300 BC dated bog oak. The wo...

Cedar wood has been attracting me for a long time. I always liked its darker reddish color compared to light colored spruce when using as a top wood for classical guitar. Years ago when I was visiting my friend and guitar builder I finally discovered its beautiful smell and totally felt in love with it. Last summer I visited my distant family in Vancouver B.C. and the smell of cedar wood was present everywhere in the forests. I remember when I was passing recently finished cedar wood fencing and I had to stop and just smell to the freshly cut wood for a while. I could stand there forever. I wasn't working with wood back then so I didn't bring any from my trip apart from some drift wood. If I were working then my suitcase would be filled with pieces of wood and they would probably stop me at the airport for trespassing the law. We are finally getting to the point why I am writing this. My friend gave me a piece of cedar wood so I naturally had to make a tea scoop from it. The w...

This was in my head for some time. I used steel brush to create a textured surface on this elder wood scoop. I usually sand and polish both inner and outer side of the scoop. Sometimes I follow the natural state of the outer surface leaving it as original as possible and sometimes I cut it and sand it so it is flat. This time just I enhanced the surface of this piece of wood. I rubbed it with steel brush to create a wrinkled texture on the surface and just slightly sanded and polished it. It feels very pleasant in the hand, soft and warm kind of the feeling and I love how it looks. Nice contrast to the highly polished inner side of the scoop. Here are some photos but one needs to touch it to fully appreciate. I think I will be using this technique when piece wood ask for it. One more thing, I haven't been working with black elder wood for some time, nice to come back to it. I have some beautiful wood from very old, long dead trees. Looking forward to this. I like wood's light...

I just wanted to share this tea pick made from an unknown root. The wood is so beautiful and I also like how the shape came out.

New pieces up on KlasekTea. http://www.darjeeling.cz/en/accessories/wooden-tea-utensils

After some time of contemplating I felt ready to touch the beautiful piece of bog oak I received. It is absolutely gorgeous wood with interesting texture and very pleasant sweet, kind of nutty smell. Also the grain is exquisite. It feels like you are working with piece of coal. Absolutely love this. I will hopefully get more of this wood. It comes from Olomouc, the city I was born near of. It was dig out near Morava river few years ago. I love that the wood is local. This wood is really magical. After polishing and oiling it is pitch black and has a incredible shine. The scoop size is 16 by 5 cm. I took some pictures this morning, I will take some more with better light later. I especially like the color contrast with green tea (gyokuro in this case).  Enjoy!