#262

NOW SOLD

Blue Spirit Stained American Ash and Chrome 

Ballpoint Pen  

 PART OF THE RAINBOW COLLECTION

EUROPEAN ASH - Fraxinus excelsior

Creamy white to a light tan in colour, European Ash is a tough, straight-grained and flexible timber with a coarse but even texture. It works well with both hand and machine tools, and stains, saws and finishes well. It can have olive coloured streaks running through the boards. With an oil finish, it can turn golden brown but it also takes spirit stains extremely well too.

I started this range of pens as my display needed a splash of colour and it is not always practical to turn acrylic pens on the canal side. The debris from wooden turned pens causes no harm at all and blows around with all the leaves and stove wood chippings. The acrylic waste is obviously more chemical based and as such I am only happy making them on wind free days when I can collect and bin as much as possible.

This pen was turned on on 13th May 2015 just after the three locks going down from Fradley Junction onto the Trent and Mersey Canal. We had a brief stop over in Fazeley to pick up some essential supplies before heading into the middle of the countryside to start replacing the stock that we sold at Alvecote. Whilst the weather was quite breezy we had one fantastically warm day before another low came in from the west to cool us down again. 

To make the most of the weather I turned some pens but left the finishing for a few days later at Branston Water Park. The turning is the messy part and finishing can be done inside on a drizzly day.