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Emmet Van Driescheand his wife , Cecilia , operate the Pieropan Christmas Tree Farm in Western Massachusetts . When he ’s not working on the tree farm or editing scientific manuscript , he pass his time carving wooden spoon and instruct others to do the same . you may learn more about him atwww.emmetvandriesche.com .
The pursuit is an consultation with Emmet Van Driesche . It has been conform for the web .
You are both a Christmas Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree farmer and a spoon carver . What is it about carving and work with trees that you find interesting ?
One facial expression I enjoy is the literal process of making something . With the spoons , it ’s the combining of aesthetic and design and skill . With the Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree , it ’s much more — it goes back to my farming roots . How do you maintain a landscape ? What ’s your human relationship to that landscape painting , historically ? How is your relationship to the landscape painting qualified on that of the people who came before you?These are all questions that have interest me , even before I came to this farm .
What I discovered through take up this opportunity is an interesting Modern way of thinking about workplace . One of the most important things about why this study is proficient for me is that it suits me temperamentally . I eff the physical study , and I love the elbow room that it ’s just a series of decisions that need to be made quick and are inconsequential in and of themselves .
The most important thing is that you just keep making them and making them and don’t get bogged down.
And I think that really suits my disposition . I did n’t know that go into this .
How long had you been selling trees and wreath when you started cut up and selling spoon ? What was the genesis of that natural process for you ?
I had this moment where I was watching my one - class - old girl crawl around the M . I was stand on the porch next to all the firewood , and I think , I feel like making something mightily now , and I could betray it . We were short , we want money , and I had already made these spatulas for our kitchen . I thought , I bet I could make some of those and deal them . And so I did .
I just started making them , and that first year I sell them for $ 10 a piece and they all deal , so that was about $ 300 . At the time we were pay off around $ 625 in split , so that was half a calendar month ’s rip — that ’s what the brain was through the first bunch of class . At that point I was n’t looking at the landscape and cerebration , Here ’s this thing I could get from the terra firma . It had n’t even occurred to me to think that holistically yet .
And then the spoonful carving built over a couple of years . I came across enough resources online , even though I was n’t on social media and did n’t have a cell speech sound and we had barely any internet at the theatre . I call up I would put my daughter to sleep and just sit on the floor with my laptop computer , out of stack , and show this blog and stalk people ’s Instagram accounts . I fall down that cony hole and became more and more excited about it .
Even though there are disparate parts to what you do — from Christmas trees , to wreaths , to scythes , to spoon , to lesson — they all seem to be connected through wood or trees . Is this how you see it ?
For a long time I felt like I did n’t have a business I could easy excuse to people . It was always so strangely mixed together — I did n’t know how to give voice it , or even how to think about it .
But as I did it more, and it started to work, I came to realize that all the things I was doing were supporting each other in a way where they didn’t have to be so obviously aligned.
I was a multidisciplinary major in college because I was a Panama hat and just want to learn about the sea , so I made up a major that I could wind in such a mode that admit me to reckon about the ocean . I take the same approach now : I ’m taking whatever my spot is and twisting it around so that I can make for for myself . And that ’s the ribbon that ties it all together .
Recommended Reads
Wild Apples , Real Cider , and the Complicated Art of Making a Living
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Carving Out a Living on the Land
Lessons in Resourcefulness and Craft from an strange Christmas Tree Farm
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