This spoon comes from a birch log!

A hand axe roughs out the spoon

Nowadays when you want a spoon, you go to the store to buy one. Several centuries ago that wasn't much of an option. So Scandinavians learned to make spoons out of the material they had at hand--birch logs.

On Tuesday craftsman Michael Schelmeske from Grand Marais, Minnesota, showed a class of Luther College students just how that process was done. Schelmeske is a visiting artist in Luther professor Harley Refsal's January Term course on Scandinavian handcrafts. "There's a lot of complicated physics involved in making a spoon," Refsal told the class.

But Schelmeske was up to the challenge. He drew on the birch log with a pencil, using a template. Then he used a hand axe to chop away the unneeded parts. Finishing work was done using a carving knife.

"I like using hand tools," Schelmeske told the class. He says he learned the craft from neighbors in the Grand Marais area--and from years of practice on the craft.