Charlie is a retired school teacher of 36 years; 26 of those years were spent teaching woodworking to high school students in both Miami and Titusville, Florida. Charlie’s love of woodworking ignited when he began observing his father build fishing boats for the family in their backyard shop. In his 3rd year of teaching Charlie transferred to a new school and became friends with the current woodworking instructor of the school. When the current woodworking instructor decided to transfer into the drafting position, Charlie was able to secure the position as the woodworking instructor. This was a pivotal move in Charlie’s life; not only did woodworking become his passion but now he had access to one of the finest equipped woodworking shops in the state of Florida. Charlie taught both day and night school and worked at home on the weekends to make wood products for craft shows on the weekends.
Charlie’s shop classes always had wood lathes and he spent a great deal of time teaching his students techniques on the art of bowl making and spindle turning. However, upon retirement from his teaching job with the state of Florida in 2007 is when Charlie’s artistic passion with nature and his love of woodturning began to emerge. The vases he turns become the canvas for his art work. For Charlie, like so many others, finding his own identity was very difficult, however, once the inspiration came, he was able to incorporate the skills he taught his students on how to carve and turn on the lathe to capture the scenery on his one of a kind vases.