MOUNT VERNON — Valerie Hoff has a lot of bones to carve before she and her husband, Gerald, head to New Zealand in early November. Hoff planned to spend the day Saturday working in her studio as part of the annual Maine Craft Weekend.
“This is the first year we’ve participated, so I don’t know what to expect,” Hoff said from her studio at 16 Carver Lane in Mount Vernon. “I definitely like the concept.”
Maine Craft Weekend’s website bills the event as a statewide tour of Maine craft studios, breweries, businesses and events, and as an opportunity for the public to explore the life and work of craft artists and craft brewers in Maine.
The organization that runs the event received a $41,000 grant from Maine Office of Tourism that was used mostly for marketing this year’s weekend. Signs along the main streets of Mount Vernon directed visitors to Hoff’s studio.
“Most of the people today will probably be visiting the breweries,” Hoff joked. She wasn’t sure if she’d get any new business from the weekend, but Hoff expected to be visited by many past and current customers.
“So far, we haven’t found anybody else out there that do what we’re doing,” she said. “Most of the work I do now is repeat customers, because they keep thinking we’re going to retire, and they want us to make stuff from them before (we go away).”
Gerry Hoff, 74, grew up in Kennebunkport with tools in his hands and was a longtime high school art teacher before taking an early retirement to help his wife with her new carving business in the early 1990s. Valerie Hoff suffers from chronic back pain, and she discovered that having such intense focus on the carving helped decrease her awareness of her back pain.
“I learned how to do this as an apprentice to a carver in New Zealand, and it just sort of took off from there,” Hoff said. The Hoffs use moose bones they get from local butchers for the carvings, which can take anywhere from several hours to an entire winter to complete.
“This mermaid is not a piece I can rush into, so I have to take a lot time with her,” Hoff said while holding an in-progress mermaid piece. “There are also these pieces of naked women that I doubt if they’ll ever get done.”
The couple produces mostly necklaces and other jewelry; but occasionally, larger, custom pieces are ordered.
“We were carving with beef bone at the beginning, but then somebody hit a moose and asked if we wanted to try using the moose bones,” Hoff said. The couple uses the leg bones of a moose, and she said the bones are so much better to carve in.
When the couple first started using moose, however, the practice was illegal. A change in state law to add moose bones to the list of salable parts that included head, hide, hooves and antlers legitimized their business. Now the pair sell their designs mostly through their website. Prices range from $45 for an Earth Mother symbol to $425 for a mermaid.
Though the Hoffs no longer have their studio open five days a week as they did until a few years ago, and though her back condition limits Valerie, 68, to short intervals of work at a time, she thinks that she’ll always be carving in some way or another for the rest of her life, “unless something like my eyes or my hands give out,” she said.
“The rest of it I am good at modifying, like using a ratty old recliner that I can change the position of all day long. I can change positions all the time, which helps my back to not get worse.”
When her and Gerry get to New Zealand, bones they bring from Maine are taken and fumigated before they are shipped to them. Hoff said they’ll carve almost every day while they are there.
“We have bones over there, too, and we’ll carve all the time,” she said. “I have drawers full of bones in New Zealand … because I don’t know what I want to work on a lot of the time.”
Elsewhere in the Kennebec valley, Stained Glass Express in Manchester participated by hosting its seventh beginner’s glass bonanza. According to a news release by owner Janet Parkhurst, the business puts together a day of fun and creative glass projects. There were workshops on stained glass, mosaics, fused glass, working with stencils and using a torch.
“When researching the list of sites participating in the weekend, the stained glass business in Manchester caught my eye,” said Mark Swanton, of Portland, who came up with his wife, Elizabeth. “We can’t wait to get inside and try our hands at making stained glass.”
Other participating sites included individual potters’ home studios, craft galleries, glass blowing studios, outdoor installation sites, nonprofit craft organizations, craft-based schools, craft beer breweries and craft beer brewery-restaurants.
Jason Pafundi — 621-5663
Twitter: @jasonpafundiKJ
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