Beatriz Zuazo

Like many other woodworkers, Beatriz Zuazo took an indirect path into the field—hers perhaps a bit more indirect than most. Raised in southern Spain, she studied translation in university, specializing in Russian and English. Then she lived for five years in Russia. She worked for part of that time at the Spanish consulate in Moscow, where she did written translation and some simultaneous interpreting. After returning to Spain, she translated for various agencies and for a Russian newspaper, but eventually she realized she had hit a dead end. What to do?

Restoring furniture for her apartment in Barcelona sparked an interest in furniture making. Finding no suitable training available in Spain, she considered traveling to England or elsewhere, but that was too expensive. In the end, she took a local furniture design course, though it didn’t provide the building skills she wanted. A three-year stint of computer drafting for a large furniture company followed. She was in the right field, but at a desk instead of a bench. She’d been sharing a shop with friends and using it after work, and then one day she decided to leave the desk and become a full-time woodworker.

To hone her hand skills, Zuazo took classes with Germán Peraire at his workshop in the countryside an hour from Barcelona. Some years later, that connection blossomed into a work partnership. Peraire had seen Zuazo develop her skills in marquetry, and when he decided to build his tall cabinet, he asked her to do the marquetry for it. Zuazo, who typically works small, had to find a way to create such a large marquetry sheet on her scrollsaw. Luckily, the design provided the solution: She simply divided it into sections by cutting along the branches that run from edge to edge.

Finding an intimate format.

Zuazo has built a range of furniture but feels most at home making boxes and embellishing them with marquetry or parquetry. The marquetry designs on these boxes, created with natural and dyed veneers using the double-bevel technique, were inspired by urban photographs taken in Mexico by Guillermo Rodriguez.

A home for one’s things.

For this jewelry cabinet, Zuazo made the marquetry on the drawers with shop-sawn veneers and left them in their natural tones to harmonize with the olive ash back panel.

Elegant Veneered Boxes

Veneer creates striking patterns, yet construction is straightforward.

The decorative carvings of Kristina Madsen

Kristina Madsen gets her carving inspiration from textiles, nature, tradition, and some amazing and distinguished mentors. See the results and get an inside view of the process.

Gesso Highlights Carvings

Kristina Madsen embodies her carvings by scrubbing tinted gesso into the facets of naturally finished or painted surfaces to create contrast.

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Olfa Knife

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