Taking used urban timber and turning it into art
Live Again Lumber, a new company in Red Bank, is producing some of the finest and most creative furniture in the region. The furniture’s unique aesthetic comes from a combination of upcycled materials and an innovative combination of manufacturing techniques.
The company’s owner, Dustin Blewett, sources the urban timber using his residential Chattanooga tree removal service. Trees that are growing in our cities occasionally have to be removed, due to storm damage, power lines, new construction, etc.
These trees could supply 30 percent of the nation’s lumber demand, but most of them are ground to mulch in giant wood chippers. Noticing this fact, Dustin asked the question “Why strip our woodlands for materials, when there is lumber literally in our back yard?”
Chattanooga hosts a veritable cornucopia of tree species. There are over 25 different species in the area that are eligible for urban forestry, several of which are considered to be exotics by the rest of the world. White Oak is one of the finest, and within the species are several hundred varieties that all produce different grain patterns.
This is why cataloging every tree before it goes to the sawmill is vital, so that discriminating clients can know exactly what variety of wood they are getting. The sawyer’s knowledge of the wood and how to cut it makes the ultimate difference in the end result, much in the same way that a butcher’s understanding of meat is what makes ground chuck different from filet mignon.
Live Again Lumber’s sawyer, John Jenson, is an expert at making the best cuts. If these cuts aren’t made at the proper angles, the wood’s value is diminished. He uses a technique called Quarter Sawing to square off a tree by making four cuts to remove the bark, and a series of successive cuts to make slabs, sideboards, and figure cuts of the middle.
In a figure cut, you can tell where limbs were, and where the grain has been shaped by natural factors, stretched by wind, or struck by lightning. These cuts are used to make most fine woodworking products, from musical instruments to bowls.
After it is cut, the wood is cured in a giant kiln that was made in partnership with Southern Tool Steel’s founder, Arnold Erwin. The massive device, made with a shipping container, allows years of drying to be accomplished in a short time.
Air drying takes a year for every inch of thickness, plus another additional year—so for a two-inch thick slab of wood, it takes three years to air dry. With the kiln, hard woods can be dried in six weeks, and pine can be dried in seven days.
“If you’re going to work with wood, you have to dry it before hand, and then work to straighten it after it is dry,” Dustin tells us. “During the drying process, there is a period of water leaving the wood, and then sap. A living tree is composed of around 50 percent water. You can get the water content down to around 12 percent by drying it with the ambient air in this region. For fine woodworking like furniture, cabinetry, doors, etc.”
He uses a kiln to take it down to around two percent water content, which collapses the cell walls of the wood. Then, when the moisture content is brought back up to that of the atmosphere, the wood no longer expands or warps.
During the kiln drying process, the wood is fumed with ammonia to enhance the grain patterns. The ammonia reacts with the tannins in the wood, darkening the denser parts of the medullary rays, and increasing the grain’s contrast. After the wood is dry, it is sanded and naturally finished with oil and shellac.
In some cases, an additional layer of interest is added by burning the wood with 15,000 volts of electrical current. Electrodes are attached to both ends of the wood, and the burning occurs between the poles. This process creates an organic, branching pattern that fittingly resembles the structure of a tree.
Once it is finished, the wood can be used in a variety of ways, from furniture to custom doors and construction. For their furniture, Live Again uses steel bases that are fabricated using upcycled industrial equipment, like a bulldozer sprocket, or pistons from a huge excavator.
The steel bases have a clean, polished look, and are extremely durable. They are also modular, easily broken down, and re-assembled.“Rather than looking at something as a structure-defined thing, and seeing what is there, I imagine a piece without restrictions.”