Love Spoon Pattern from David Western

[BobD]

Hi Gang,
Dave asked me to post this:

With Valentine's Day rapidly approaching, I wanted to encourage my fellow Woodcarving Illustrated forum readers to try their hand at lovespoon carving!

Nothing will say "I love you" to your sweetie, favourite family member or friend quite like a handcarved lovespoon! Trust me, I've been making them for years and I've yet to hear a complaint from anyone who has received one!!

This pattern is a bit of an 'old school' design based on the traditional Welsh panel-style lovespoon. I have deliberately avoided fretwork so that the spoon could be carved with an absolute
minimum of tools. I used a small straight knife and a bent-knife to carve this one, you could easily replace the bent-knife with regular gouges to carve the spoon bowl.

I have stayed with straight edges which can be easily cut by handsaw or with a knife and although I cut this spoon from a 3/4 inch thick piece of wood to have a bent neck detail, you
could use a 1/4 inch thick piece and make the spoon flat. If you want to jazz up the design, you can easily fret out some of the designs or hearts....conversely, if you want to simplify it a bit, you can leave off the chipcarved border.

The spoon can be further personalized with dates, initials, names or a romantic quote (I stayed with a simple date and initials on this one);. You can even go 'whole hog' and carve a poem on the back!!

I used a rare piece of Gary Oak for my spoon, but were to do it again, I would probably recommend something more even grained like birch or alder given the busy chip carved details.
Please also note that in the top left corner of the spoon, I have carved a small section of the border with additional 'defining' lines. Some like this detail and some hate it, so I thought a
nice compromise would be to show both!

Even if you have never carved a spoon and your area of carving expertise is completely removed from this type of thing, I hope you will give the lovespoon carving a shot and that you
will send in pictures of your completed pieces!

The spoon is 9"-long, 4 1/8"-wide at the widest point, and 3/4"-thick (although any thickness from 1/4 inch to 1 inch is fine for this).

[LBlake]

This is a great idea, and a nice, simple pattern, full of possibilities. Thanks to David for thinking of this, and for sharing!