Carolina Alumni Review - September/October 2010

New Again
Making the Old

KRISTI SCHENK

You might say Turning House Furniture sells used furniture. Or rather, the materials its furniture is made from have been used for other purposes.

Turning House salvages structures built between the Civil War and World War II that are in too poor condition to be safely renovated but still have value in their pieces. The company turns the materials into furniture with a traditional look but a very modern environmentally friendly mission.

“The main purpose of the company is to serve as stewards of the
environment,” says Ross Craig Levin ’ 83 in his new job as vice presi-
dent-chief marketing officer. “We are on the leading edge of something
people may be required to do in the future.”
Such buildings are “deconstructed,” saving wood, nails, wire, whatever
can be reused. Turning House takes the wood, mills and dry cures it,
heating the boards to 100 degrees for six days. The wood is then made
into furniture. This is wood you can’t buy anymore. For example, there’s
slow-growth pine. “It’s
very dense,” Levin says.
“The sun had a hard
time getting in
between the trees, so
you get tight, old-
growth wood. The
trees in buildings made
between the Civil War
and World War II were
200 or 300 years old.”
— Susan Simone
fiddleback
maple
wormy
chestnut
black
walnut
Harvested Grains
Some of the unusual salvaged woods:

Southern
longleaf
pine

Ross Craig Levin ’ 83 shows off his own Turning House purchase, the Lille Cube Table. It is made from reclaimed beams of old-growth longleaf pine, finished in a burnished auburn stain and nestled in an oiled bronze frame. “It’s made from four beams that are fused together,” he says. “When you look down from the top of it you see the growth rings. My wife and I have counted 130 on just the section we can see.”

COURTES Y OF LANDIS CI T Y HALL

Corriher Mill near the Turning House warehouse in Landis was one of the early 20th- century buildings the company salvaged to make new furniture. The company estimates that its reuse saved an estimated 19,000 new trees from the saw. To read about it and other heritage buildings the company has “deconstructed,” visit www.turning- housefurniture.com/ about_deconstructed. html#.