Looking for some ideas.....

Stuart Ablett

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Tokyo Japan
A good friend of mine Don, who used to live here in Japan and his wife Miyoko and family moved back to the US a few years ago. His wife is Japanese, he father lived here until he passed away a few years ago. Miyoko is now in the process of clearing up her father's estate, this involves selling some property. One thing that is to be sold is the family home. It is a very old Japanese style home, with lots of wood, in fact it is a beautiful old house, but, it is in poor condition, and it will be torn down. There is some beautiful wood in the home, but I'm not sure I could make proper lumber out of much of it, a lot of the main beams etc are huge, but as they were placed green and then let dry over the many years most of these are full of cracks, this is very common in timber frame construction. Miyoko has asked me to take some of the wood and build something as a reminder of the family home. I'm kind of stumped as to what to make, so I'm looking for ideas. Two that I've come up with are picture frames and some small boxes of some sort. The other thing is that I can't really make large items, as they will have to be shipped to the USA from Japan.

I'm hoping to go out to the site soon and have a look at what is there, when the house is demolished I'll get the crew to put aside the wood I select and I'll go and pick it up later.

OK if you have some ideas, I'm all ears :D

Cheers!
 
i agree with something that they would use frequently or at least on special occasions stu,,so they can have the feeling of the old family with them. i was thinking of a small wall cabinet but if shipping is high then that is probably out, was thinking of one to hold some of the family keepsakes..
 
I know that you are NOT into pen making but a nice pen/pencil set with a classy box would be nice -- Maybe laser embossed with family/house history.
 
Depending on what you find and can salvage....tea boxes, platters, plates, small lamps, snackpins:), toothpick holders, bird house ornaments, napkin holders, rolling pins, cutting boards, salt and pepper grinders, small hand mirrors, shadow boxes, pens and pencils, jewelry pendants....just off the top of my head.
 
A small box containing a familiar and visibly obvious piece of the house like a key escutcheon , door handle, father's desk drawer pull, etc.? My western suggestions of items are probably not exactly usable but, may give an idea. If he wore glasses, a small case for them could become a family treasure.
 
How about a personal keepsake to her to remind her of her Father and the house? Something that can be passed down from generation to generation. If he was a chess player I would suggest a chess set, but how about something turned like plate or bowl or box with a nice design drawn on or picture set into it of the house and or the father. Something that she can treasure? I am sure that the gears are whirling around in your head Stu look forward to seeing what you make. Bet the wood is hard as stone and will put your tool sharpening skills to the test.
 
I have a very different tack. Get a pic of the house. If it has classical Japanese style "dojo" looks take the wood and make a small model of the home. I am thinking no bigger than 12" x12" . Would be a fair amount of model making but a neat reminder of the family place. There is obviously great emotion in it to her. I dont see a piece of unrecogniseable wood made into something else having the same effect.
A model is something that along with a pic could be seen by grandchildren is 3D and can be related to the picture. If there is a family picture going back to when the house was in its prime then frame that as opposed to what exists today. If its a modern characterless building like an aparto then can my idea to file 13.


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A wild idea - if her father was cremated, how about a new urn for his ashes, made from the house beams. If they are split, I bet you could line the inside of the urn with bondo or epoxy to provide integrity while maintaining the external appearance.
 
Hey, Stu. Rather than making a dayly or special ocasions useful thing as has been suggested ( Nothing against that) Why not make one of those small ancestors houses or shrines that they keep at home and burn incense sticks or candles? In this way, the use of the wood would be dignifyed, and because it comes from the real house of the ancestors, it would be like if the house continued to live with the family. You could even include some receptacles to keep their ancestors ashes if they do that in Japan. Dunno
 
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I talked to her yesterday and I'm going out to see the house on Monday and figure out what if any wood will work for me. She wants to give me all the decent wood that is in the house as she does not want to see said wood just be landfill, but she is not a wood worker and does not really understand what is useful or not.
I guess by Monday night I'll have a much better idea of what is there.


Thanks for all the ideas guys!:thumb:
 
Well the plan changed, I went this morning, and I just got back, some pictures.....

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The house


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A stone picnic table of sorts.


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This one long log, or beam is 10.5 meters or 36 feet long, the big end is about 18" in diameter and the small end is about 12" in diameter. I'm not sure what the wood is, if it is not badly cracked I can certainly get some lumber out of this piece of wood. They will cut it into 6' lengths for me, anything longer will be impossible to move around.


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The piece in the middle of the picture with the green tape on it is a very nice piece of Keyaki, I'll be keeping that.


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This too is Keyaki, but a very special piece of wood, it is grown that way, on purpose, they wrap the tree with sticks and rope and then let it grow for a fairly long time, then they dry it and strip all the bark off, sand it then put a lot of clear coat on it. If you were to buy a piece of wood like this for you house these days I bet it would cost over $10,000. There is no used market for this stuff.


Well that is it, the rest of the house is just construction grade stuff, or thin veneer over plywood.


Cheers!
 
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