Lightening does strike twice….
The original design for this bar doesn’t look much like what you see here and those two huge slabs of red gum are the reason why. Supplied by the client, the slabs were sourced from a rural Victorian farm. Sometime in the 1960’s the goliath was struck by lightening and split where it stood. It stayed this way until the mid 2000’s where it was then set on fire by the farmer to try and rid it from his property. It stood strong.
A few more years passed and the farmer took to it with his chainsaw, she final fell. It was then the farmer saw its real beauty and made the decision to cut it into slabs to sell. I for one am very grateful for this as it gave me the opportunity to showcase this gorgeous species.
With the live edges still charred from the fire we made the choice to leave as much of it in place as possible and rework our plans for the bar to accommodate its natural state. It would have been a shame to chop it off after all it had endured. So with the mantra of my first boss ringing in my ears “If you can’t hide it, make it a feature” we set to work on shaping it into what you see now.
This is a bar going into a private residence so it not only had to look good, it had to function.
The decision was made to go with conventional joinery below bench height to enable plenty of storage and to provide support whilst showcasing the red gum.
The slabs themselves, once joined, are now in a horizontal explode view and separated by a piece of curved, powder coated steel.
The original design for this bar doesn’t look much like what you see here and those two huge slabs of red gum are the reason why. Supplied by the client, the slabs were sourced from a rural Victorian farm. Sometime in the 1960’s the goliath was struck by lightening and split where it stood. It stayed this way until the mid 2000’s where it was then set on fire by the farmer to try and rid it from his property. It stood strong.
A few more years passed and the farmer took to it with his chainsaw, she final fell. It was then the farmer saw its real beauty and made the decision to cut it into slabs to sell. I for one am very grateful for this as it gave me the opportunity to showcase this gorgeous species.
With the live edges still charred from the fire we made the choice to leave as much of it in place as possible and rework our plans for the bar to accommodate its natural state. It would have been a shame to chop it off after all it had endured. So with the mantra of my first boss ringing in my ears “If you can’t hide it, make it a feature” we set to work on shaping it into what you see now.
This is a bar going into a private residence so it not only had to look good, it had to function.
The decision was made to go with conventional joinery below bench height to enable plenty of storage and to provide support whilst showcasing the red gum.
The slabs themselves, once joined, are now in a horizontal explode view and separated by a piece of curved, powder coated steel.
