If I am walking through a forest or other such copse, very occasionally I might stumble across (or over) a dead tree or branch which has fallen askew. I'm not sure of the legal status of taking fallen trees from woodlands, but let's just suppose that in a completely unrelated turn of events, I found myself in possession of one of these dead trees. In this post, I will walk through how I transformed it into a wooden candleholder fit for the table of any organic vegan tofu bistro experience restaurant.

First things first, I stripped all the bark using an old kitchen knife and then I chopped the gargantuan tree in half with a basic hand saw. I decided to work with the top-half, since the effects of decay would be minimal - for the longest time I did not realise that when a tree dies, it starts to decompose from the inside-out, forming a hollow channel right through the middle from the base of the trunk upwards.

After making the trunk more manageable, I cut a rough candleholder length piece and started by scraping away any remaining loose bark or stringy bits which might get in the way of things later on. I used an electric sander with a pretty high-grit sandpaper to work away any dangly loose parts. I also had to cut away and smooth out a huge ridge I had left behind on the top of the piece. Turns out cutting unwieldy trees is not my forte.

Next, I sat the tea-light a top the now clean piece and marked out where the hole should go. I must confess, I do not have a drill-bit large enough to properly mill out a tea-light sized area. Instead, I used a selection of drill bits and a small knock-off Dremel to remove material in a painstakingly slow fashion. The results were reasonably OK, but not the neatest of things.

One of the extra things I did with this piece was to mill out a little cubby disguised as a natural branch point in the wood, in which to place stones or shells. In order to achieve this, I made an angled hole on the side to emulate the place a branch would have grown from. After smoothing out with the Dremel's grinding attachment, the hole was perfectly pebble-sized!

Next up, it was time to sand, sand and then sand. Working the electric sander deep into the grain, moving from 80 to 120 grit paper, each edge was tapered and all the remaining bark material was stripped away. Holding the sander upside down, I rubbed the base of the piece over to ensure the bottom was flat. After all, a wobbly candleholder means spilt wax. Finally, I worked to smooth the edge of the tea-light hole itself, such that removal and insertion of a candle would be much easier.

Next, I used some wood filler to neaten up any crevices that annoyed my inner perfectionist. Notably, I filled most of the tea-light area with some filler to cover up my shame - sorry, I mean to cover up the holes left behind by the hap-hazard milling process.

Finally, I made sure to remove any rotten material from within the hollow tube formed by the decaying tree - having rotting matter spill out over the table at our organic tofu bistro salad experience would not at all be favourable with the clientele. Using a long thin drill bit, I removed any soft or squishy bits and left a clean, dry centre behind. Capping off the end with wood filler, and leaving it to dry completely, meant the piece was ready for oiling.

To give this piece a deep lustrous feel, and to highlight the grain, I treated the wood with Danish oil. Using some kitchen roll (a lint free cloth would have been better), I applied a generous coating of oil, making sure to get into any holes or cracks, soaking and treating the grain of the wood properly. After drying for a couple of hours, I finished the wood with some steel wool - the fibres acting like tiny metal knives - to take off the top microns of wood and give a satin finish.

After working every edge, corner and grain-line with the steel wool, the piece was finally done! If you wanted to, you could do another coat of Danish oil to give an even deeper shine. With some pebbles from a gravel garden (doodles by my Mother), and some shells from a beach of your choosing, this candleholder is ready to illuminate the faces of the diners of a boutique organic low-sodium tofu salad experience cult.

Or, to give as a gift to friends.

Thanks for reading this walk-through of wood whittling! It was a great process, filled with the joy of bringing something half-dead back to life with DIY!