This piece was turned from the trunk of an approximately sixty year old japanese Shiro Plum tree, harvested on our farm two weeks ago at the end of its productive life. Shiro plums are large delicious translucent yellow juicy plums. The tree trunks are coarsely fluted. Remarkably every Shiro plum tree I have seen has its flutes twisting to the left, for intriguing reasons so far unknown. Recently turned bark and wood varies from yellow to orange to deep reds, blacks and maroons. In time these glorious colours darken into rich browns. I usually turn spheres from these trunks but this time I celebrated the fluting by turning a hollow cylinder parallel to the trunk, which resulted in a much more masculine looking piece. The intrigue of the convoluted form and the richness of the internal colours of this tree always draw me back to the rewards of classical woodturning, and humbled at the richness of natures own beauty. This piece is 15 inches high, 10 inches in diameter, and finished with several coats of glossy rub-on poly. It is mounted on an embedded, suade-based lazy-susan, for ease of observer rotation.
