Tools

Prehistoric lumber

Prehistoric lumber

Ancientwood, Ltd., is a US company that imports 50,000-year-old Kauri logs that have been preserved for millennia in peat bogs under New Zealand’s northern island. Besides its value as a conversation piece, ancient Kauri is mined, rather than logged, and no live trees are killed in the process. Kauri trees (Agathis spp.) thrive in New […]

Through-color MDF

Through-color MDF

German chemical giant BASF pioneered the technology to colorize the traditionally blah-colored world of manufactured wood products like medium-density fiberboard (MDF). Besides requiring no or little finishing, through-color MDF will not betray scrapes or scratches like painted material. It has been available in Europe for awhile now, but only relatively recently in the US through […]

The Zeer pot

The Zeer pot

The Zeer pot is an African cooling gadget which, for less than $2US in local materials and without electricity, can extend the storage lifetime of fresh produce by as much as 18 days. It is of staggeringly simple design: Two clay pots are nested with a relatively thin layer of sand between them. The sand […]