Wood Wildflowers is a collaboration between father and son. All of the work we produce is based on our love of nature. Our flower designs begin with extensive photographic research. Sometimes we're able to grow the flower and take notes of the shapes, color and texture during the blooming stages. We choose a flower to model based on color, shape, and simple elegance. Once we’ve decided on a flower, art meets engineering. Making wood flow into smooth, delicate curves to mimic flowers in nature can be a difficult task. The many discarded prototypes lining our shop walls are proof of that.

Recreating wildflowers in wood is a process of selective simplification. We try to key in on the most distinct characteristics of a flower (often developing new production techniques as we go) and build up levels of detail until we’re satisfied we have an elegant and accurate, yet reproducible representation of nature.

Inspiration for our vase designs can come from almost anywhere. The silhouette of a bird on a pond in the morning will often inspire an entire week spent in the shop cutting out new vase shapes as is evident in the “Signature Series”vases.
Occasionally while browsing through the lumber pile a piece of beautifully figured wood will jump out and demand to be featured prominently in a new vase design as was the case with the “Feather Series” vases.

As avid outdoorsman, it has been a blessing for our work to bring us in such constant contact with nature. Not many people can take a walk in the woods and call it research and for that both my dad and I are truly grateful.

Sincerely,

—Nathaniel Nienow
—Theodore Nienow