One-of-a-Kind Woodturnings Hand-crafted From Select North American Hardwood and Softwood

Bill Stephenson has been a Woodturner and a student of woodturning for about twenty years. In 2001 he moved the facilities of WoodArt Studios from Loveland, Ohio, to Santa Rosa Beach, Florida. He produces One-of-a-Kind Woodturnings, all Hand-crafted. He teaches the art of woodturning in his studio and has taught professionally at the Appalachian Center for Crafts, John C. Campbell Folk School, West Florida University and other venues. He has published a book titled Victorian Woodturnings and Woodworks, and over twenty-five of his articles have been published in periodicals in the U.S., Great Britain, and New Zealand.

Bill has served as a Director of the American Association of Woodturners, as president of the Ohio Valley Woodturners Guild, and currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Emerald Coast Woodturning Guild and on the Executive Committee of the Cultural Arts Association. He is a member of the American Association of Woodturners, the Woodturning Center, the National Wood Carvers Association, the Local Color Artists Association, Cultural Arts Association, and the American Crafts Council.

His approach to designing the turned object is to create a blend of the aesthetics inherent to the wood coupled with an expression of the underlying art form. The object should first represent the intended form, and secondly, take on an artistic expression. He is influenced by his environment and by the natural surroundings where he lives, works and plays.

The raw material – Wood – that Bill uses in his creations is salvaged, from power line construction, road construction, building construction, cabinet shops, and, of course, tropical storms. Each tree is different and each section of wood is different, so an emphsis is always placed on representing the wood that nature has provided in the best possible manner yielding one-of-a-kind objects of art.

His works have appeared in numerous woodturning expositions including the first and second national woodturning expositions, Ohio Artistry in Wood, Ohio University Museum, and most recently in The Best of Florida – Woodturning exposition at the Orlando Museum of Art, and he has won many awards in juried competition. His works are held in a number of private collections.

Bill markets his work through galleries, art festivals, websites, and his studio. He has many repeat customers. The creation of woodart takes time (some say it actually evolves) to be enjoyed for a lifetime.