This most gracious lady entered woodturning almost by accident. She trained first as an artist, emphasizing design, and has been influenced by urban settings (including hubcaps and manhole covers!) as well as salt marsh patterns near her current California home. She has also lived and studied in England (where she started a woodturning club) and the state of Georgia. School course scheduling problems caused her to take Chinese cooking and woodworking courses. There she created furniture and started woodturning, both greatly influenced by the Asian culture.

Merryll starts with design, and usually does many sketches, sometimes hanging a sheet of sketches behind her lathe for inspiration. For many projects she will actually start with a ruler and lay out the woodturning profile on paper. This becomes vital when turning large platters of glued up wood 2" to 3" thick, for safety as well as success in turning.

Her day started with a slide show and showed rice bowls in a box, barbells, 14" segmented "donuts," sushi trays, salad bowl on table stand, etc. She recommended entering competitions to become known, advising that the pressure inspires creativity and finer craftsmanship. Merryll works with dried wood and, being brought up during the Great Depression, avoids waste and exotic woods. Many turnings have been dyed so her concentration could be on form and design.

This extraordinary and refreshing demonstration did NOT spend hours on the subject of tools, grind angles, flute shapes, types of steel, turning techniques, or other "guy stuff" tech talk. Again, the emphasis was on design, form, texture, and color. An underlying theme was "have fun, get joy from what you do, experiment, let accidents inspire creativity." She mounted one oak blank on our Stubby lathe, and only turned enough to demonstrate grooving and scorching. There was no intent on producing one or more finished turnings that day. The objective was to show us techniques for enhancing woodturnings.

For instance on the back of the demo turning, she recommends a clear plastic flexible ruler for laying out groove patterns, so one can see wood grain and get a sense for spacing grooves that seem pleasant. Her tool was an old small gouge ground to a point. She likes to layout the foot tenon with a 6" sliding square, to get both diameter and safe depth for chuck jaws to grip well.

Then she used a propane torch to impart various scorching patterns, from light charring to deep blackening of the wood. Merryll also told us how concentrated heat in one area can impart warping of the vessel ­ note the creative mindset at play here. She described how, in laying up planks for making a large turning blank, she takes time to shift and move the planks for the most pleasing grain effect, prior to gluing.

Safety was often mentioned; no rings, watches, sleeves, long hair, high rpms, use a face shield, etc. when AT the lathe, and use care with various paints and finishes as some are volatile, some poisonous, keep oily rags spread outside or in closed metal container, watch out for open flames.

As Merryll shifted to other methods of surface texturing, and the use of color in its many forms, the world of infinite possibilities opened before us. Her home studio is on the lower level of her home and she has taken over the whole floor ­ 2 bedrooms, garage, storage area and a darkroom now used for finishing, and the wood shop is a floor below that! (NOTE: Build another shop! Get another big table. Seek ye more space for thy art!)

To texture she has a Foredom & hand piece, Dremel, and air grinder along with many different burrs, chisels and engravers. Add wire brushes, files, rasps, 24 grit sanding discs, etc. She textures more than carves.

For coloring there is a huge variety of stains, dyes, oils, acrylics, milk paint, universal colors, bleaches, brushes, pens, pastels. She demonstrated mixing and applying some of these and encouraged us to make sample boards,& take notes of what "chemistry" worked so you can do it again.

In summary, look in odd places, visit hobby shops, experiment, take the time to "be free and play."

Thanks Merryll; you are delicious!

--Bob Heltman

Merryll's Website

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