Greg Aanes, the owner of Greg Aanes Furniture, and employee Steve Cheldelin, work on a hall desk in the garage of Greg Aanes Furniture. The garage is full of all different pieces and sizes and cuts of wood, soon to be transformed into unique handmade furniture. Aanes currently has a small total of four employees that make the furniture, as he oversees. Usually there are at least six people producing the furniture. Aanes says he has had many people come and go in the shop, and some of the good ones stay. “I’ve kind of collected people like I’ve collected wood,” Aanes says as he stands around the many pieces of raw wood.
Woodworker Todd Vandyke sands down a cherry wood bench with an electric sander. He stands in the workshop, right outside of the finishing room.
Vandyke turns on the humming pre-catalyzed lacquer machine and tests the spray nozzle. Catalyzed lacquer is a finish that chemically cures the wood and keeps it durable for a long period of time, this aids the wood throughout its use and abuse as furniture. It creates a “modern finish” Aanes says, who has turned up the heat in the room to a high 90 degrees in order to ensure the lacquer will harden and dry quickly.
Greg Aanes strokes a leg of the cherry wood stool, waiting to be lacquered, noting the smoothness of the wood after being sanded down by Vandyke.
Vandyke finishes the final stage of lacquer application to the stool which on average takes about two or three minutes. The station that the stool sits in is covered in layers of old lacquer, staining the walls a variety of splotchy tan to brown color. The stool will be fully dried in a couple of hours.
Aanes and Cheldelin try to figure out how to fix a faulty drawer on the hall desk. They both fiddle with the drawer that is stuck for about ten minutes. Finally Aanes finds some sticky furniture felt pads to put on the bottom of the drawer, aiding it to slide smoothly, just like the drawer to the left.
Aanes sits in his office holding a hard copy of rough drawings of furniture dimensions. On the computer he displays a digital design of dimensions of a dining chair with arms.
LEFT: Walking up the stairs leads straight into the door of Aanes’ office, but a sharp left turn leads to where Aanes keeps fresh newly shipped wood, untouched. An outstretched limp wooden human artist mannequin lays on top slabs of drying mango tree wood. The mango wood is shipped to Aanes directly from Hawaii, still green and dripping sticky sap. The trees harbor little centipedes that, once their home is stripped of moist bark, run off to freeze in the Northwest climate, Aanes says.
RIGHT: The dark brown and light caramel tones of the mango wood’s grains combine and intertwine to create a unique and easily identifiable contrast of design on a rocking chair, finished and on display in the Greg Aanes Furniture showroom. Aanes is highly known for his handmade array of chairs. “We live on our customers that come back,” Aanes says. “They come back because they were once rocked in my rocking chairs when they were babies.” He says the regular customers keep them honest. An oath to customers to continue making quality, unique and beautiful furniture.
