Magazine Series

We were inspired to learn more about red spruce from an instrument-making perspective, so we visited luthier Don Wilson in Arlington, Vermont, and asked him a few questions. Why use spruce in…

On the morning of September 6, 2013, 275 canoes and nearly 700 paddlers converged at Old Forge Beach in New York’s Adirondack Park. Eager anticipation lingered in the air as canoers…

Photographer Frank Kaczmarek captured this impressionistic photograph at a small pond in northern New Hampshire. “Including the lily pads in the frame, in a small way, reminded me of…

For those of you who aren’t following the battle to ban bear baiting in Maine, here’s a quick recap: Animal rights groups are pushing a ballot measure that will ask voters this…

Well, it took some practice, but I’ve finally learned to pronounce “anthocyanin.” This is the pigment that manifests as deep, glossy red in staghorn sumac – one of the…

My visit to Thom Egan’s Hardwick, Vermont, studio this early spring came at the end of a very long, gray winter. It felt like my rods and cones – the retina’s receptors for…

In the last installment of Tricks of the Trade, we examined the venerable peavey, and offered several modifications to make an already invaluable tool even handier. Now it’s time to head…

Northern Woodlands co-founder and former editor Steve Long found this design in the heartwood of a maple tree he was bucking for firewood. People in Orange County, Vermont, are justly proud of…

Nearly 40 years ago, I discovered some curious bear feeding sign on a mid-elevation ridgeline in northern Vermont. A pole-sized bigtooth aspen had been peeled to its roots like a banana.…

Donnie Hardwick Jr. is a spitting image of his father. In the picture hanging in the lobby of the family business, Donnie Sr. sports a scraggly beard, wide-rimmed glasses, and a blue crocheted…