hawaiiwoodturning.com
HC 01 Box 130, Kaunakakai, HI 96748

Hand-Crafted Treasures from Rare Hawaiian Wood

Jack Ewing is a wood turner here on Molokai specializing in creating Koa bowls, Bark edged Koa bowls, Curly Koa bowls, Norfolk pines bowls, and Hawaiian Kou, Milo and Kamani bowls and Hawaiian calabashes. He also woodturns Norfolk Pine lamps with Milo bases. The Norfolk Pine bowls and lampshades are turned very thin which allows them to be translucent creating something like a wooden Tiffany.

Wood for making Koa bowls is getting very difficult to obtain and the supply of Koa bowls and Koa calabashes is becoming very limited. Curly Koa bowls are almost non-existent.

Molokai doesn't have many woodturners, which allows him to obtain a large amount of rare Hawaiian hardwoods such as Koa, Kou, Milo, Kamani, and Monkey pod. Norfolk pine isn't that rare but the thin Norfolk pine bowls and lamps made from it are some of the most beautiful pieces he creates.

Besides Koa bowls he makes traditional Hawaiian Kou, Milo and Kamani calabashes. Kou is one of the rarest of the woods and was the most desired wood of the early Hawaiian "woodturners" for making Hawaiian calabashes. Unfortunately about 180 years ago an insect was introduced (spider mite) which all but decimated the Kou tree population in Hawaii. The Hawaiians used Milo, Kamani, Koa and Monkey pod for calabashes after the demise of Kou. Jack was fortunate in obtaining a couple of large Kou trees from developers and probably has the largest contemporary collection of Kou calabashes in Hawaii.