Functional Slabs of Art

When a hand-crafted, solid hardwood table top stretches fourteen feet in length and almost four feet in width, how big was the log from which it came? "Sixteen feet long and my 6,000-pound fork lift wouldn't even budge it!" says wood artist Robin Wade. In February 2007, when a local logger brought the monstrous log to the RWF studio from his work taking down a huge local tree, "We had to move our sawmill to the log," Robin says. Within a few weeks, the log was milled into huge slabs (each one movable only with the fork lift), debarked with a draw knife, and stacked for drying.

More than three years later, the Slow Studio began work to turn one of the slabs into a functional slab of art - a conference table.  Today, the finished piece is on display at The Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail at The Shoals . "The tabletop and legs are from the huge log, but we can't confirm the species," says Robin, who called in three arborists for a consultation—besides its color, it has an appearance similar to white oak. The table's stretcher is a ten-foot-long slab of a curvy walnut tree. But beyond its size and unique wood species, the table has several distinguishing features courtesy of Mother Nature—a hallmark of each RWF piece.  "There were several soft knots in the slab, so we removed the dead wood and sanded them down," Robin says. For a moment, Robin wondered if the slab was too rough for a tabletop. Instead, folks comment on the slab's natural character, and Robin says that these "holey knots" give the table its personality. The conference table is wholesale priced at $14,000.

But this table is just the first RWF piece crafted from the huge milled slabs. What's to become of the others? No one knows—yet. Robin hopes to craft custom designs for specific rooms and spaces from the slabs. If you have a need for a large piece and/or you love the wood's grain and color, email Robin to chat about a custom piece for you or your client.

Functional Slabs of Art