An experiment in carving

 

Above and below are a few shots of my most recent work. I have enjoyed the meditative time sketching and carving these designs, though they do take a while. I am not sure if the extra 90 minutes of carving will add enough value to make them worth the effort, and this sends me spiraling into the vortex of hourly wage calculation. I know this is not smart, and I know I don’t do this work to get rich, but we all have to earn a living at the end of the day.

Bowls like these take a lot of time, when all is considered. First I have to fell the tree, chop it into 4' lengths, end-over-end the lengths out of the forest, chop the lengths into rounds, split the rounds in half, and then shape the split halves into bowl blanks. Let's say that fist step of processing the material takes 20 minutes pr. bowl blank. Then I have to turn the blanks into finished bowls. That takes 40-60 minutes, if all goes well, but not every blank wants to become a bowl! I lose about 25% of the blanks to knots, bark inclusions, etc..., so we should add at least 15 minutes to each successful bowl. Once the bowl dries, I can then do the carving, which adds another 90 minutes. Finally paint and oil, which adds maybe 25 minutes and includes material costs. That adds up to at a minimum three hours of labor, but probably more like three-and-a-half or four.

So what can I charge for bowls like the ones above and below (once completed)? Can I get $100 for them? Or even $80? Depending on what I can sell them for, it is pretty obvious to me that I might make $20/hour on them, but probably more like $15/hr. Honestly, if I could sell them reliably, I would say GREAT! I would take that salary! But I am not sure I can. We will see. These bowls are sort of a test run.