The Table’s Story. All objects have stories; most are never told. This table began in 1946 when a maple seed drifted onto the west-facing side of a cove leading to Haw Branch, the creek that empties into the Big Ivy near Barnardsville, NC. Over the years the seedling grew into a sixty-five foot tree, fourteen inches in diameter at chest height. Then, in 2014, a storm with wind and rain uprooted it, tumbling with it two other maples of about the same size, where they lay unseen or at least unremarked for three years. Beginning with death and rest in rain and snow, pigmentation fungi and fungi zone lines developed within the wood. Fungi damage wood, but the pigmentation and zone line type do so at a very slow rate, so that beautifully spalted wood results that can still be used for flooring and furniture. What commercial furniture makers see as flaws, is to craft furniture makers marks of nature’s beauty. Nature’s flaws are not all beautiful, but spectacular examp...
