Woodworkers hope to carve out a home in NOTL for their annual show

With the success of this year’s Wonders of Wood show and competition held earlier this month in Niagara-on-the-Lake, the Niagara Woodcarvers Association hopes to return to the community centre on an annual basis. 

The group of just under 50 members holds its regular meetings at Heartland Forest in Niagara Falls, where it traditionally hosted its annual show. A reconfiguration of the building there, however, left them with insufficient space to accommodate the large number of exhibitors and vendors last year. 

So for 2023, they took over one of the arenas in the Gale Centre in that city. But that show was in May after the ice was removed from that arena. With the 2024 show moving to November, they needed to find a new home again. 

“I took our committee here for a tour,” Colin Chilvers, the association’s president, told The Local. “The space here is more than adequate. We like that it has the (Sweets and Swirls) cafe, too. Some of our members asked if Niagara-on-the-Lake is open on Sundays. They were happy to hear it was because they could bring their wives to go shopping while they were at the show.”

To be fair, most of the exhibitors were men of an advanced age, some of them with their wives beside them at their tables. But there were a few female carvers at this year’s show, such as best friends Margie Cooper and Terry Parana, who met in a woodcarving class many years ago. 

Cooper, who told The Local that her 19-year-old granddaughter has carving since she was three, was displaying an intricately carved version of the shoe that the old lady lived in from the nursery rhyme. Her creation has a pedigree as an award-winner. 

“I took bark-carving lessons,” Cooper explained about the shoe. “This was a work of love for me. When I entered it into a competition I beat my teacher. He was thrilled about that.”

The competition aspect of this year’s show was on full display when visitors walked into the auditorium. On the Best of Show table were David Alpearca’s Indigenous Woman Warrior (Best Wood Carving) and John Zawaly’s tissue box (Best Wood Art), among others.

A new member of the association, 42-year-old Hassan Ghatani of St. Catharines, was one of the younger exhibitors at the show. He was showing and selling his unique vases and bowls made of reclaimed wood. A woodworker by trade, Ghatani has been carving since he was in his late 20s and has many of his pieces at galleries and shops in Toronto.

“I met a gentleman at the show yesterday who was 96 years old,” Ghatani said. “He has been carving since he was six years old. That’s a very fun part of this show, hearing stories like his.”

The club plans to permanently change the timing of the event to November so its participants can connect with early Christmas shoppers looking for unique gifts for their family and friends. 

And gifts galore there were. Magic wands, elaborate eagle’s heads, various carved birds and art made of empty thread spools. There were Itotem poles, Santas, trucks with working wheels, chess sets and even a wooden baseball glove that looked stunningly like the real thing.

Many of the participants used their time at the two-day show to work on their projects. All were happy to answer questions from admiring browsers. 

Bob Arthur, a member of Port Colborne’s Phoenix Artists Group, was making his creations with his pyrography, or wood-burning tools. His whimsical and detailed depiction of a woodworker who cut his sawhorse in half was a highlight. 

“These are just a sample of the power tools that I use,” said Arthur. “I’ve been carving for almost 20 years. I switched to power tools because physically I can’t hold a knife to get it to do what I want anymore.”

Peter Daniels, another Phoenix member, stood behind an elaborate castle that he had carved out of cottonwood bark. It was complete with lights, a moat painted green and working pulleys. 

“It took me about eight months to do this castle,” Daniels explained. “The bark makes it easy to carve. I really enjoy doing these castles. I start at the top and I work down and just keep going. The hard part is deciding when you are actually finished.”

For the aspiring carver in your family, the club’s past president Barrie Casement was offering up a variety of tools, and 78-year-old Howard Bogusat of NOTL was selling an assortment of butternut and basswood he has accumulated over his more than four decades of carving. 

“I’m downsizing right now,” said Bogusat, who has been carving for 44 years. Like Arthur, he recently switched to power tools.

“I used to do boards but now with power-carving, I just grab a hunk of wood that some might consider firewood,” said Bogusat, “and I make something beautiful out of it. I let the piece of wood talk to me.”

Casement offers woodcarving (also known as marquetry) classes out of his home workshop in Welland. Both he and Chilvers explained that although the finished projects on display over the weekend were very intricate, the basic carving techniques aren’t difficult to learn. 

“The thing is to learn how to use the knives and chisels,” Chilvers said. “You have to start out doing something easy. Usually, that’s a bird or a mouse. It gives a rookie carver a sense of achievement and urges you to keep going on and on.”

And NOTL residents will get to experience next year's show show and sale in their own neighbourhood. Casement confirmed on November 21 that an agreement to return to the NOTL Community Centre the first weekend in November, 2025, has been reached. 

NOTE: The Local learned that just nine days after the show closed Colin Chilvers, a Fort Erie resident who won an Academy Award for the special effects work he did on the 1978 Superman movie starring Christopher Reeves, passed away at the age of 79. Our condolences go out to his wife Colleen, all of his family and to the Niagara Woodcarvers Association community.