I was among the 9 judges for this year’s Fresh Wood Student Design Competition, and we had a good time scoring an impressive field of pieces and hashing out a consensus on each category. Although the contest showcases the work of both high-school and post-secondary students, we were very pleased to give the Best in Show award to a high-school student!  I think that was a first for the competition.

The winner was “An Apple a Day,” by Tyler Duperron of Fletcher’s Meadow Secondary School in Ontario, Canada. It also took first place in the Open category for high-school students. Duperron stack-laminated rings of MDF and then shaped it to create a perfect apple skin, topped with maple veneer that suggests the creamy inside of a ripe Delicious. The shaping was impeccable. Consider how complex the contours of an apple are. Even the stem (walnut or rosewood, I think) was beautifully shaped.

Personally, I was equally smitten with a little jewel of a cabinet from Andrew Wallace of the College of the Redwoods in Mendocino, Calif. Sure, I’ve seen these Krenov-inspired cabinets before, but they are beloved for a reason. When perfectly done, like this “Scotch Cabinet,” every detail is considered, from the proportions of every element down to the pulls and the spacing of the dovetails in the drawer. Perfectly fit knife hinges are a thing of beauty all by themselves. By sawing a yaka (yeah, I’ve never heard of it either) board into thick veneers to cover the whole exterior, laminating them with kwila for a light interior, and keeping the frame members very thin, Andrew Wallace created a low cabinet I could live with for decades. The tiny snakewood (another weird West Coast wood) pulls might have been my favorite element.

In my opinion, these two pieces stood head and shoulders above everything else.

I’ve also included a few of my other favorites from the show, whether winners or not. With nine judges, I didn’t always get my way, so I guess this blog is my revenge.

 

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