The wood our kitchenwares came from
Birch trees have the beautiful and elegant white silvery trunks with a pale bark that flakes like shedding a skin keeping them forever silvery-new. I gather the shedding allows the trunks to grow and expand, but also for them to photosynthesis as their bark is thin enough to allow them to do that. It means they can make ‘food’ from the sunlight even before they’re in full leaf.
Our birch came from a large sustainably managed woodland near Benenden in Kent, managed by a friend of Amy, the wood carver.
Being sustainably managed means the wood is looked after to make sure enough light is let in the wood floor and trees and plants have the space they need to grow strong in. It also means encouraging bio-diversity and native species so the woodland is restored to its own healthy balance.
Sometimes self-seeded birch needs to be thinned out to let more light in for the slower growing oak and ash trees which is all done as part of sustainable woodland management. It’s trees that have been felled in this way that Amy uses to carve her beautiful homewares from, including the kitchenwares she did just for us with their hand-painted yellow handles looking perfect against the pale Birch wood of the spoon and spread