Woodworking

The lights dim slightly as the power saw surges to life. Even before entering the visitors recognize the familiar sounds of whirring machinery. At the saw, a man hovers over his latest project. The smell of fresh cut oak is in the air. There is a sense of anticipation as the visitors approach their friend. He stops the saw and holds up a nearby object. It is an elaborate construction with trusses and supports. “How do you like it?” They admire the piece. “It’s a drawbridge for the trainset,” the boy exclaims. This will provide new opportunities for creative design! The man beams with joy as he imagines the hours of delight this new piece would provide. Well worth the effort.

But before a woodworker can perform his craft, he first needs a place to work. So, he designs his workshop. It has space for materials, tools, machines, and workbenches. The layout of the room facilitates the work. The machines have plenty of clearance. The work tables have 360-degree access. An orderly collection of tools decorates the walls. And there is a careful plan for managing air flow and sawdust. The workshop design is not an end in itself, the design provides the craftsman the freedom he needs for creative designs in wood.

It is careful work, but the craftsman knows his trade. The customized maple rocking chair, the grandfather clock, and the distinctive teak fireplace mantel show the designer to be more than an expert. He is an artist. But his favorites are the miniatures. The dollhouse with finely crafted furniture, the ark with rooms for hand-carved animals, or the segmented train tracks with an assortment of curves, crosses, ramps, and bridges. Why are these his favorites? Because they inspire hours of creative design at the hands of the children who enjoy them. His designs are nested too, just like the birds in a previous post.

Could it be that our universe is a carefully designed workshop for a Master Designer? Not only does the planet provide a habitable environment for life, but the double-helix DNA molecule supports a code for life, hosting software that enables the construction of proteins and their assemblies which subsequently enable the remarkable innovations of the natural world—creatures that inhabit the ocean depths, alpine heights, even the stratosphere. The design doesn’t end there, for these amazing creatures are designers themselves, from elaborate termite mounds whose natural air conditioning supports farming of fungus to the trap of the antlion, whose carefully sloped snare captures its unsuspecting prey. Nested design.

Humans are designers too. Who gives us this ability?