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A friend of mine brought me this slab cutoff of some 100+ year old sinker cypress that he got from someone he knows and asked me if I wanted it. Well, it's wood so of course I'll take it. The guy he got it from goes out and recovers these logs from local lakes and rivers here in NW Florida and then re-saws them into flooring, mantles, or whatever, then sells them for an ungodly amount of $$$$. The slab he brought me is about 7' long and has been sitting in my shop for a couple months, I had no idea what to do with it until it hit me one night while I was laying in bed, a Picture Frame!

So the next morning I went out and cut a section off the end and re-sawed a 7/8" slab with the bandsaw. Then using a cheap 8X10 picture frame I bought as my template to cut out the recesses for the glass and the backer. The corners are half-lap joints cut using the router table. I've never worked with normal cypress but this sinker cypress cuts and splinters like pine if you're not careful but it spits out fuzzy sawdust like MDF.

Sanded to 320g then applied 3 coats of BLO which really made the colors pop out, considering it was just gray and dull looking after sanding. My wife is a local photographer so she chose a photo that would fit the overall theme of the frame. It's not the most beautiful looking frame but it's more about the history of what it's made of and where it came from, topped off with the photo I think it completes the whole theme. This will be a Christmas gift for my Mom who comes down here from Ohio for vacation every year and absolutely loves the beach.

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You took the best from that piece of old lumber! Nice frame.
 
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