Buying wood in France

There is, or was as of last August, a gallery with the turnings of a lot of the big names whose work you would know in Saint-Remy_de_Provence which doesn't seem too far from where you are. I can't come up with the name of the woman who runs it, though; she is a turner and might be able to steer you to sources. The town is small and you shouldn't have a problem finding it with a few well placed questions. And, even if the gallery is no longer, the trip will be beautiful, the town is beautiful, good food, good wine... -- what can I say.

Bill

I just looked it up -- one map source says it is 84km.

Bill

the big names

from where you

turner and

have a problem

longer, the trip

Maison du Tournage in Carlencas IIRC is somewhere in that area. They have a website.

You could try a websearch using the département code for the area with the words" tournage" and "bois"

The June 2004 Woodwork magazine has an article in it about a French woodturner named Jean-Francois Escoulen. The article goes on to say that his village is named Puy-St. Martin and it is in the south of France. I think he might be just the contact you are looking for. Good Luck, Bob

Hi, you already got lot of good advices. The galery in St Remy de Provence is "Sèves, Art et Nature" address is: MAISON DE L'AMANDIER

11 Boulevard Marceau 13210 Saint-Rémy-de-Provence

There is currently a very good exhibition of turned wood art, from May

1st to September 30. for more information, call +33 4 42 20 28 72 (or 04 42 20 28 72 from France)

for a wood supplier, you can contact Pascal Champetier near Montpellier. he is a very nice guy, and has good prices on typical woods of South of France, including olive wood. just give him a call to know what he currently stocks. (I recommend you try "Cade", a local variety of juniper) his website is

(phone number at top of the page)If you are near Nyons, then you are not far away from Jean-FrancoisEscoulen. Unfortunately, he is giving a course in Arrowmont from June 27 to July

1. I don't know what his program is after this date. you can call his wife Monique. phone number on his website
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there are many turners in the area you will be visiting, don't hesitate to contact me by email if you need further info. enjoy your vacations,

Pascal

Yes : "Maison du Tournage" is a good place to go for wood and tools (at least for French people since the tools are usualy cheaper in UK !)

Their website is :

is in French language but I think they can speak English if youphone them. Go there if you can : CARLENCAS a marvellous little village and the whole valley ("Haute vallee de l'Orb") is a great place to see, walk ...

Jean-Yves (from Toulouse / FRANCE)

I've just come across a website that may be of use for the French woodturning association,

for the english version. It includes contacts for all their branches.

Dave, I enjoyed the interesting and a bit different websitesite you offered, even if I'm not in France.

Pascal, If Leif is allowed to rise above his station claiming that he turns in an Atelier d' Art why can't I claim the junk I turn on my deck is art en plein air? Arch

Fortiter,

AFTAB is our local (small) equivalent of AAW, and we try to translate all site pages in English. Good to see our efforts are usefull to some. I recommend a visit to the 2004 exhibition pages:

I think you are missing some capital letters here: you shouldsay "Art en plein air" ;-)(though yesterday I had a whole day turning "en plein air" in a skiresort, it was barely 10deg C (50F), and my cold hands would havebetter appreciated to be in an heated Atelier d'Art) Pascal

Thanks to all for your good advice and recommendations.

First, I found out that even though Nyons is probably the most famous olive region in France, little or no olive wood actually comes from there. All of the olive wood souvenirs we find in the shops actually come from Italy or Spain or north Africa. Thanks to the search tips in one of the posts, I was able to find a local carving school (wood & marble) less than a mile from where I was. The teacher there was wonderfully enthusiastic and helpful. He said if he's lucky, he'll find out about a down tree but its so rare, even members of his own club are very secretive about where they find their olive wood. Having said that, you can imagine how appreciative I was when he gave me a gift of some olive wood and some boxwood to take home.

I did call Jean-Francois Escoulen but it turns out he was in the States teaching. I also called Alain Mailland but he wasn't very helpful. Said he was very busy and wasn't really enthusiastic about visitors.

Didn't get down to St. Remy de Provence but my friends have it on their own list to visit the gallery. I've been there before and it's a wonderful village(the sanitarium where Van Gogh was is just outside town and terrifically interesting).

Thanks to all of you for your good advice. My lack of planning put me in a time crunch but I go back each year to visit friends in Provence so next year I'll be better prepared.

...JS