Fumed Oak

This is our 7th Black Box limited edition ghost, and the third wooden one. These have again been carved from English oak by the highly skilled Mr Gamble. He stamps each on the base with his name and the ghost edition number.

We wanted to create a ghost which evoked the timeworn qualities found in Jacobean oak furniture, 17th century church pews or Tudor panelled rooms. There is a great richness to the wood in such things. The lustre and surface has been affected by centuries of touch and wear, the accumulation of hundreds of years of grease, polish sunlight and smoke.

Influence was taken from The Holy Trinity in York, just a few hundred yards from our shop on the Shambles. Holy Trinity has the air of a hidden treasure. It stands in a small, secluded, leafy churchyard, accessed through a gate made in the same year as the battle of Waterloo and tucked away behind Goodramgate - one of York's busiest shopping streets. To visit, you pass through an eighteenth-century archway tacked on to buildings that served as artisans' workshops in the fourteenth century.

The church itself is full of character. The floors and arcades are charmingly uneven. Light filters through the windows, illuminating honey-coloured stone with dots of glass stained crimson.

The building dates chiefly from the fifteenth century, but has features from its foundation in the twelfth century right up to the nineteenth century. The box pews, unique in York, are exceptionally fine, and an interesting collection of monuments and memorials paint a picture of life in this busy city throughout the ages. Standing in the cool calm of the church it becomes easy to imagine that from the greatest nobleman to the poorest pauper, from the holiest saint to the most desperate sinner, all have sat in these pews before us, pondering their failings and begging for mercy, many have left their mark and the marks are not just physical.

The Black Box Fumed Oak ghost is made using tools and techniques that have not changed over centuries. Each ghost is hand carved and “fumed” before being finished with an oiled rag to give a dulled lustre akin to antiquated wooden objects.

“Fuming” is an old woodworking process, and was an accidental discovery in made in 18th century England after it was noticed that oak boards stored in a stable had darkened. This was caused by the ammonia fumes from the horse urine reacting with the wood, exposing the wood to fumes from a strong aqueous solution of ammonium hydroxide which reacts with the tannins in the wood. The process works best on white oak because of the high tannin content of this wood. Fumed oak is also called smoked oak, and is a way of colouring the oak without using a wood stain or dye, the result is a rich dark chocolatey oak with warm highlights much like the Holy Trinity pews.

We didn’t want to resort to pastiche, these are York Ghosts made by hand in 2020 but they look, feel and smell like objects from an other time. Hold them, let them take the natural oils from your hands, let them develop their own rich history and glow.

Batch of 23 online

Release date : 1/5/20