SAGAMORE WOOD SHOP

I’ve been a creative person my entire life. As a child, Legos, models, drawing, sculpting and such, has been as much as a part of me as breathing.

It lead me to various jobs over the years. But my principal desire as growing up was to work in the movies. There I could exercise all my creativity and interests abound. While I imagined I’d one day work at a visual effects studio, the reality is you can’t do much of that at home when I was a child. Nowadays, it’s almost commonplace to be able to create visual effects on your phone. Still, I wanted to pursue this desire regardless. So I turned my sights to another creative role: that of a makeup artist.

I grew up on the original Planet of the Apes movies. King Kong (and Son of Kong), Mighty Joe Young and whatever Ray Harryhausen was animating. Star Trek of course and finally Star Wars. I could not as I mentioned do much of those things easily. But I could do makeup. Some wax, greasepaint, hair, glue and so on and I could create something right then and there. My course was set. I pursued makeup as a career.

Easier said than done.

Still I studied, learnt my craft and eventually began to work in the field. I had some success and some dry spells as did most of everybody pursuing that craft. But the dry spells and increasing advent of computers in the field made me realize that a lot of what I enjoyed was going to be replaced by computer graphics. It’s been a mixed bag, while computers have altered a lot of the field and replaced things I might have done before. It hasn’t taken over completely. But there isn’t any aspect of entertainment that hasn’t been dramatically changed by computers. And with the more recent advent of AI imaging, it’s only going to become more and more uncertain.

Make no mistake, I enjoy computers. I actually service them in my day to day job. And I am not a technology snob. But I miss getting my hands dirty. Physically being able to touch something I create and not have to pull it up on a screen to show somebody.

Which led me to woodworking.

My father was not a trained Artist or craftsman. But he put his mind to something and he figured it out. Long before YouTube, Wikipedia and such. And he would not have known what to do with them had he hand them available. He knew they would be important to his children one day, but he had little use for them. He created. He painted, he built. As a child, he took our unfinished basement and made it into a multi room environment for our family. Complete with a bar, playrooms, built in stereo system, Laundry room and various see throughs that became places for puppet shows. But I remembered him framing out the rooms and the smell of freshly cut lumber, pounding nails and paint. And to this day the smell of sawdust takes me back there.

And oddly, I found myself doing much of the same at my house. Building built ins, a fireplace, a loft bed for one of my daughters and so on. I learned a lot doing that. I watched endless hours of videos on woodworking and I absorbed it like a sponge, as I did on any subject I enjoyed. But I think I shared my father’s innate ability to look at something and figure it out.

And with that, I found something I could enjoy once again and create anew. While computers have been creeping in on this field too, it has its place. Ultimately there is something it can’t do: handcraft something.

So I endeavor to create, by hand, something I can enjoy doing and hopefully you out there can share in as well.

This website is an ongoing affair. It will grow and expand in time showcasing my work and offer it for sale and take commissions too. I don’t intend to completely rule out other materials in my process. I may from time to time crack open my old tool box of sculpting tools and a fresh block of clay and see where that takes me.

It’s also a family affair. My daughters (twins) are both creative as well and will help out from time to time on various items. And maybe in time learn what I can teach them. My wife encourages my crafting and is an excellent sounding board for things when I get too far off track.

All in all, I am looking forward to this chapter of my life. And I hope you out there may find something interesting in what I do as well.

As always, there is a comment section below, send a message or inquiry about anything you see and I will get back to you.

~ Paul C. Reilly jr.