The creative possibilities of woodcrafting shared

By Zenaida Serrano Espanol
Advertiser Staff Writer

Furniture builder Alan Wilkinson works on the top of a display stand that he will enter in this year's show. Wilkinson won Best of Show last year with a dining-room set made of koa and other Hawai'i-grown woods. Gregory Yamamoto • The Honolulu Advertiser Na La'au O Hawai'i Hawai'i's Woodshow 2002 — the 10th Anniversary Opens Saturday Hours: noon-10 p.m. Mondays-Saturdays, noon-6 pm. Sundays, through Sept. 22 Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center, second floor, 'Ilima Court Free admission. Validated parking at $1 an hour. 479-7042 or charijean@aol.com

Bowl? Sculpture? Table? In his mind, the possibilities are endless.

"You just need to have a passion and appreciation for local woods and for nature," the novice woodworker from Pearl City said. "I like to look at something that was living and a part of Hawai'i and turn it into something that has a part of me in it."

Uyehara is among more than 70 woodworkers who will share their enthusiasm and creations at Na La'au O Hawai'i, or Hawai'i's Woodshow 2002, opening Saturday at the Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center.

"The purpose of the show is to highlight our local woodworking community, the artists, and to utilize woods that are locally grown," said Marian Yasuda, the show's staging chairwoman and owner of Yasuda Designs In Wood.

The event, organized by the Hawai'i Forest Industry Association, will give interested visitors a chance to talk to some of the state's most talented woodcrafters, take part in carving and wood-turning demonstrations, and view nearly 140 works, many of which are gallery quality.

The pieces, which include miniature canoe replicas, furniture, guitars and poi pounders, are entries in a juried competition. Categories include furniture, wood-turning, sculpture and musical instruments at open, student and novice levels.

Uyehara, who also is a salesman at Woodcraft Hawai'i, will enter two calabash-style bowls made of koa and kiawe.

But the competition, Uyehara said, is secondary. High on his list of priorities at the show will be picking up tips and tricks from expert woodworkers. Experts like 59-year-old Alan Wilkinson, a furniture designer and builder for more than three decades, who won Best of Show last year with a dining-room set made of koa and Indian rosewood. Wilkinson took nearly three months to fashion his prize-winning set.

This year, the Mililani resident and owner of Wilkinson Koa Furniture will enter simpler pieces that took six weeks to make: a pedestal table and display stand, both of which are made of koa and pheasantwood.

The annual show is significant because it "demonstrates that there are other woods here in Hawai'i besides koa," Wilkinson said. Woods that are not all endemic but all Hawai'i-grown, such as mango, kamani, milo and Norfolk Island pine, as well as lesser-known varieties such as macadamia, lemon gum, robusta eucalyptus and kiawe.

"Some, in fact, are invasive pests — and to make a really beautiful piece out of a tree that someone considers a pest is a pretty good use of it," Yasuda said, laughing.

The show is a great way to showcase the talent of the individual woodcrafters, Wilkinson added. Most furniture pieces displayed in Hawai'i showrooms are made with computer-aided design programs, he said, then are mass-produced, often in foreign countries.

"The pieces you will see at the wood show are designed by local individuals, built with the help of machines and the exacting precision of hand tools and the human eye," Wilkinson said. "That's how things get done on a smaller, more human scale."

Yasuda hopes visitors to the show gain an appreciation for the level of work that's being done in Hawai'i. Most pieces on display will be for sale, with prices ranging from $200 to $15,000, she said.

"There will be something for everybody," Yasuda said.