Hal Usher segued an “addictive” hobby into a small business that showcases the best of the territory’s woods. His graceful bowls are made of wood scavenged from trees downed for various reasons on St. John and St. Thomas.
“I got this from Miss Lucy’s Restaurant when a big tree went down,” Usher said, showing off stacks of sea grape that’s he’s busy turning into bowls.
Sea grape has lots of grain, which makes for lovely patterns in turned bowls, Usher explained. He also works with mahogany and an interesting wood called cordia. In addition to the brownish wood color, it includes grays, reds and yellows in the grain. Usher got a big piece of cordia after he spotted it along the side of the road near where he lives on St. John’s southeast arm. He knocked on the door, got permission from the owner and cleared away the downed tree.
“And I made her a bowl,” he said.
Usher, 70, does all this at a small container turned shop parked outside his house. The view all the way to the British Virgin Islands is stupendous and the breezes keep the dust at bay.
Turning wood is a long process, starting with the actual turning. Usher said he likes this best.
“You lose yourself in it,” he said.
Then comes the sanding, a task that uses successively finer grits of sandpaper. The wood is then coated with several coats of tung oil or non-toxic salad bowl oil.
“That’s the tedious part,” he said.
Usher, who made furniture as a hobby before taking up wood turning three years ago, learned his craft from master wood turner Avelino Samuel. He took classes from Samuel, and soon was turning out his own line of wood bowls.
He’s semi-retired, selling his wares at the Friends of the Park store in Mongoose Junction, at Full Moon of St. John Gallery in Coral Bay’s Cocoloba Shopping Center and at Christopher Gallery and Gallery North in Stony Brook, N.Y. He spends summers in his native Long Island, New York, helping his son run the tree and landscaping business he started.
He graduated from the University of North Carolina with a bachelor’s degree in Russian studies, but soon signed up with the U.S. Air Force and became a pilot. A career as a TWA pilot followed, but he said he was bored. The tree and landscaping business came next.
After a summer with the East Coast trees, it’s back to St. John in the fall at his shop with a view.
When he’s not turning wood, he spends time with his family – wife Kerstin and five-year-old twin daughters Abby and Zoe. He also has three grown children, Joel Usher, Jeff Usher and Michele Aronica, who all live on Long Island.
“And I go snorkeling,” he said.
