A Day with Paul Schürch

I'm still in LA after WIA'12.  Today's plan was to go visit Paul Schürch at his studio in Santa Barbara for, oh, maybe a couple hours then chat over lunch.  I went with Chris Wong and Roger Savatteri, two pros I hang out with so I look like I know what I'm doing :)

We started out with a brief tour then started talking about what people are working on.  Paul and Roger are both very creative minds.  After a bit of discussion, it became clear that they both worked on a project bid against each other.  Being a fly on the wall to listen to the inside stories of the project was very interesting especially to hear two very creative designers exchange how they created what they did and exchange lessons learned.

After an excellent lunch together, back to the Schürch bat-cave for a look at his archive of finished projects.  I've seen most of them in books or on his site, but to see the spinning cabinet or game table up close was a treat along with answers to all the questions you could toss out.  There was even the veneered clothing on display alas without the lovely model.

Many of his works in progress were around the shop including one based on some pietra dure, which is marquetry using stone.  Imagine a stained glass panel made of stone... Some very interesting stuff coming out of Paul's shop this year.

We spent 8 hours together; what an amazing day!  I only expected to hang out for a couple hours.  Paul and Roger both may be in a bit of a dog-house... Good thing I brought some bottles of local Arizona wines to hand out as Get-Out-Of-Jail cards.  Hope it works :)

In other news, Roger decided to kindly give me his lathe, assuming I can get it in the car! No hard stops... Great timing so I can put it on the back patio as the weather is finally sub-100F. Hope I don't get a catch and launch a gouge into the neighbor's window...

I did take some video of Paul's completed projects as well as his shop.  I'll edit that this weekend after I get back home so you can peek at the work and description from the maker.  'Til then...