Turning Boredom

Was wondering if there are many turners out there that get bored with just turning and storing there items.I consider myself an amateur in the truest sense, but have sold a few items. Mostly i just give my turnings away and people are delighted to receive them, But there comes a point when you want to know if anybody considers your work worth BUYING.

Sort of Who am I pleasing sort of thing. Most people ( at least not so far ) are more than willing to receive or take something for nothing, but the true test other that giving them away is to see if they are willing to purchase them .Its not greed but a sense of purpose also.

Anybody facing the same situation.

Keith

To one and all a MERRY XMAS and HEALTHY NEW YEAR

another method to Michael's suggestion is to donate a piece to a local charity that's having an auction.. Ask them to announce it as "a work by a local artist", so that your name isn't involved to influence the action..

Local turning club may have a way to get your turnings judged and appraised. One problem is that sometimes things that look nice and are well done are not sellers in the marketplace which would make you think it wasn't a good piece if you were trying to sell it. Our club has an "instant gallery" in which members can bring their pieces to turining seminars given by accomplished and sometimes well-known turners for a critique. You don't want to be too thin-skinned for this level of judgement. I am a hobbyist too and have been reluctant to enter the selling game because of possible house-insurance issues although I haven't investigated if fully. Billh

Excellent idea. Billh

The problem with this is that things that appear to matter to the turning cognoscenti may not necessarily matter to a potential purchaser. When did you last see a member of the general public turn a bowl over to see if you'd finished the bottom off "properly" for example, or get a pair of callipers out to see if the wall thickness is constant to the nearest millimetre? That isn't to say that you shouldn't aspire to a higher level of craftsmanship, it's just that only you and other woodturners will ever really notice the difference.

I say make things that *you* like, and there's a fair chance someone else will like it too. Works for me!

The first thing I've seen a lot of people do is pick up a bowl and turn it over, just to see how it 'feels'. If its not finished well, they will see that. They can 'feel' if the wall thickness is not consistent. These points are both important for the sale-ability of the piece.

rick

Read what I wrote, please! I wasn't implying in any way that we should try and pass off shoddy workmanship onto the general public just because they don't know any better, just that the exacting standards of someone judging a piece in a competition aren't necessarily those of someone buying a piece at a craft fair. I too can feel if the wall thickness of a bowl is not consistent, but there comes a point when the difference is so small you can only measure it but not feel it, and certainly not see it, so where do you draw the line?

As an example, take the perennial question of whether we should go to the trouble of removing chuck recesses on the bottom of bowls or not. Personally I don't bother, but I do make sure they're sanded and finished as well as the rest of the base of the bowl, and I'll sometimes just put 2 or 3 concentric grooves in there with the point of the skew for "decoration". Now I know that there are some who go to great pains to reverse chuck and remove all traces of chuck recesses, but I don't know of any person who's bought any of my bowls who's even noticed it's there, let alone know what a chuck or even a lathe is for that matter.

Maybe that's why I don't "do" competitions either :)

Lord No. I have only been turning for a year or so. I am so geared up for that first really bad catch I cannot get bored. Besides, after a lot of years of woodworking I am still amazed that I have at my disposal a machine that can produce a finished product without a lot of other cutting, drilling, trimming, boring, planing, shaving, etc.

Granted, it has thrown stuff at me on occasion but so does my wife.

Personally, I don't think that having your work woth buying is all that much of a compliment - the true compliment is when your work is worth so much to someone that it will never be sold.

steve

Seems to defy my over fifteen years in the marketplace. One of the things that makes possible a graceful lift versus a bowl that looks as if someone set it on a hemorrhoid cushion (foot), is the greater weight at the bottom made possible by cutting a separate curve inside than out.

The other fuss seems only to affect other turners, and they just want to trade, anyway.

I agree with you Steve.

Jim

Gee I have stirred up a discussion hav,nt I.. All of your points are well taken. I submitted mine to be judged on the basis of minimum standards,set by the local crafts council. They were excellent in there fair objective critism. ( excuse my spelling )Since then I think i have improved, but i agree with your comments about the public not nescessarily caring about exact side thickness as well as bottom finishing ( dovetails etc. The product itself will reflect if you did your very best with the skills that you have. Church charities. Maybe the best suggestion is donating to a charity and not identifying yourself. Seems there are so many people into this currently that you have to excell to get a sale.Anyhow these discussions are excellent.

MERRY XMAS ALL

Alun.. if I can presume to know your intent for a moment, I think we both feel that there is a point where co-producers will look more for how well you did it, where a buyer will go with whatever they FEEL about a piece.. I've seen folks pass by several very well turned and finished items and stop like they hit a wall if they see a wood grain or color that appeals to them.. Tactile over technical??

ahh, but you're doing all that while it's spinning, Ron.. lol

I had an interesting comment last night from yet another neighbor: (maybe we should stop having fires and tv for the group to assemble for) My wife was showing her our "Christmas Collection" of turnings, and she said something like "gee... I've only seen you make boxes and board things... I didn't know you were this talented"...

IMHO, it's way easier to make something appealing on the lathe than it is on the work bench... no uneven joints or not quite square corners, etc....

Yes, I think you've got it ... most of the people I have sold stuff to so far (friends, friends of friends, friends of friends of ... you get the idea) have no idea, and I mean not even the remotest idea, of how even as simple a piece as a bowl is made on a lathe, or "one of those wood machine thingies" as they sometimes call it! So, to expect them to reject a piece merely because it has an intact chuck recess on the base is pure fantasy. They pick it up, look at it, run their hands over it, weigh it in their hands, sometimes even smell it (!) and if it feels right and the price is right they buy it, simple.

Too add a little to this- consider what people want to buy. Remember to be honest when considering this; after all, WalMart is the largest retail outfit in the US. Then ask yourself whether or not it matters if people want to buy your work or not. If you don't need the money so you can eat and pay your bills, do it for yourself, and to hell with the great unwashed masses. I've got a few pieces I've made (and bought) that I like so much that not only would I never sell them, but I don't even let people besides my wife and myself look at them. Whether Joe Blow down the street likes them or not isn't my concern- they're important to me, and I keep them to myself in a fashion similar to the biblical injunction not to cast one's pearls before swine.

Any fool with a silver tongue can sell something- it's the value your work holds for you that counts.

Aut inveniam viam aut faciam

Ah. Exactly...

In fact, we could do a bowl in, say lacewood. Take this bowl, and create a PVC mold. Now churn out 100,000 copies in different colors. Let's pick chartreuse and periwinkle as our most common (Colors like that would be a big hit the Barbie crowd). Market them as "invaluable health aids" or "collectibles." Bingo! The latest "must have" marketing fad.

As a fad, the popularity will last a couple of months.

No thanks, I turn for keepsake purposes.

And yet: some of my works that I like best would soundly FLUNK a turner's scrutiny. This past summer, I noticed a porcelain bowl that did NOT have even thickness. The wall thinned ever so slightly about an inch below the rim. Something attracted me to the bowl. After puzzling it out, I realized that the slight extra thickness gave a place for my thumb to nestle as I picked it up. Aha! Ergonomic design. OK, actually, it just felt good.

I have incorporated that design in several turned bowls and been happy with the results. But then I'm not doing these turnings for a panel of experts with preconcieved ideas about what's "right." If was doing juried work, I'd figure out what the judges were looking for, and give it to them.

So that brings us to the burning question, "who's your customer?" If it's mass market: use PVC. Craft shows: do what sells. Turners in general: design for the "rules." Yourself: lose yourself in unstructured self-discovery!

John Maker of Fine Wood Chips and Sawdust

Excellent! I, too put grips on bowls designed for use. For salad bowls, a bit of turnout and/or some grooves at the rim can help the two-hand outside lift normally given such items. For popcorn and other "passing" bowls I prefer a turn-in under the rim for the thumb, as they generally move around one handed.

What I send the jury for any particular show varies, though the more particular and pretentious the jury, the weirder looking the pieces. I can turn anything. Selling what I turn is another matter, and that is sometimes far from what the jury finds acceptable.