Orvedal says his inspiration for the "Wakarusa" rocker came from many nights spent rocking in a boat catfishing on the Wakarusa River near his home. It is made from curly maple and padauk. The seat is coopered, the back slats are steam bent, and the arms and crest rail are laminated.>

At the museum he was introduced to the works of Wendell Castle, Sam Maloof, Wharton Esherick, George Nakashima and Arthur Espenet Carpenter. "I was blown away with what I saw, and I knew [then, it was] what I wanted to do," he recalls.

This "Germann " table is 72 inches by 48 inches and made of burr oak. It was made from the client's own tree and was designed to fit in a narrow alcove. >

For about three years, he rented shop space from G++nter De Vries, a German cabinetmaker. "That was where I learned the basics. The rest [I] learned from my mistakes and from adopting a scientific approach to furnituremaking by keeping a log with sketches and information about how long a project was taking," he says.

Over the past 30 years, there have been many elements in Orvedal's background that have contributed to who he is as a custom furniture maker. He says he has always enjoyed making things and feels that he has a strong engineering sense.

His design sense, though, is mostly driven by what pleases him. Overdal's approach to commissioned pieces allows for a kind of three-way interplay between his own sense about a piece and his ego as an artist; his customer's ideas and needs; and how the piece will develop.

This CD cabinet is made from curly maple with a mahogany base and finger pull. The doors are coopered solid maple. Its shape was designed to mimic a Bose CD player.>

Orvedal says his chemistry background helps him with the finishing process. At first he recalls trying to be creative with his own finishes. But he says he soon realized that the commercial finishes available were "so good," and it made more sense for him to use them instead.

Overdal also says his time in the repair business directed his attention to flaws and weaknesses in furniture designs that he has been able to overcome in his own pieces. For example, "The rockers on rocking chairs tend to break because the spot where the back leg is mortised to the rocker is weak. I have been developing a design for a rocking chair for 10 years [to combat this]," he says.

Made from an old red oak, this credenza table at the Topeka, KS, library features light sapwood on the edges with the vertical end panels made from limb slices, with serious heart check stabilized by cherry butterfly keys. Photos from the collection of the Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library, KS.>

"It is a beautiful spot. My shop is my refuge. It is where I like to be," he says. "I have plenty of work that comes from repeat business and word-of-mouth. And if I were to try to build my business, have employees, advertise, use e-mail, have a Web site and all of that, I would become a manager and not [be] a furniture maker."

After working in his shop, Orvedal says he likes to spend time outdoors because he is a wood "hound." Since his reputation for finding and collecting wood has grown, after storms he gets lots of calls with offers of wood.

Moreover, he says he often gets commissions from people wanting a piece of furniture made from a favorite tree on their property. A notable example is credenza tables that he made for the Shawnee County Public Library. They were made from an old red oak tree that once stood in front of the library. It was removed from the library's property to make way for a planned expansion. "The tree was older than Topeka itself, and an important landmark," he says.

Most of the oak's trunk was badly decayed, so Orvedal had to use wood from the two large limbs. The tops were edge laminated using 3-inch to 5-inch-wide strips of sound limb wood. The strips were template-routed along mating curves to follow the grain of the limb wood.

Creative projects like this keep Orvedal's work interesting, he adds, and they are also what keeps customers coming in.