Baltic by Design
Baltic by Design bowls and coasters are part engineering, part woodworking, and part New England dedication to making use of every last scrap.
Inspired by a spiral wooden wind spinner, Rob Jones set to work creating a bowl with a similar design, putting to work his skills as a woodcarver, mathematician, illustrator, inventor, engineer and entrepreneur.
"When I started working on a prototype I figured that it would be multiple rings glued up and was cutting some of the smaller rings from inside the larger ones to save wood," he says. "Through a couple attempts I came up with a design that would be cut from one flat piece which was a very efficient use of wood."
The first were cut with a scroll saw. Looking for a faster way to cut them, Rob found a local business with a laser cutting machine - which was so successful he bought three machines of his own.
A concentric pattern is laser cut from one flat piece of wood (with hardly any waste), shifted into place, and glued into the shapes you see here. The entire process takes place in his studio in Maine, with the help of his daughter and his sister.
"My work," Rob says, "is a one-of-a-kind blend of technical mastery, traditional and state of the art tools, and a non-stop avalanche of innovative ideas."
It's also useful, beautiful, and really cool.
