Tom Hudson He Taught Himself The Time-Consuming And Creative Art Of Engraving
Engraver and artisan Tom Hudson has found a special way to add an edge to his golf game.
It’s a blade hidden in the handle of his customized putter.
The engraver who builds and embellishes knives and guns will work up to a hundred hours to make a single piece - like his golf putter - unique.
Though Hudson’s hand-sketched version of the popular American scroll design is rough, when he takes his chisel to metal, his precise eye and careful attention to detail come through.
“I can actually cut it better than I can draw it,” he said. “I don’t know why. If you’re working on a piece that’s worth a few thousand dollars, you settle down some.”
And the self-taught artisan’s prize pieces sell for at least that much.
From a wooden gun case against one wall in his at-home workshop, Hudson recently lifted out a gold-plated golf putter.
“This one here is probably worth $2,500,” he said. It probably won’t see much action on the golf course. “They’re corporate gifts. CEO’s hang them on their walls,” Hudson said.
He pointed to the handle which he layered with rosewood, metal and Sanbar stag horn and then down to the head of the club where his fine American scroll engraving gleamed.
While he’s worked on guns and knives for decades, only recently did he come upon the idea of detailing golf clubs. It was because he heard Sylvester Stallone, an avid knife collector, was into golf. “I thought, well why don’t we start building custom golf clubs,” Hudson said.
Now one of his favorite items is the putter with a knife in its handle.
His pieces are more works of art and family heirlooms than hunting, sporting and carving tools, he said.
Like his art, Hudson’s workshop is off the beaten path.
To get to his small space, you have to walk through a bathroom. But once inside, what makes Hudson happiest is evident. The walls are lined with knives, golf putters and guns - his latest engraving projects and some of his earliest tries. No space is wasted.
Thirty years ago, engraving was nearly a lost art, Hudson said. Now it’s making a comeback, but the real experts are few.
“You have to have a knack to do it. It’s not something you just sit down and do,” he said.
Though, Hudson admits, he never had formal training. “I learned this all on my own.”
Though Hudson holds a full-time job with an RV dealership, he spends nearly 30 hours a week in his workshop planning new projects, answering e-mail questions from prospective customers or other engravers and tapping away with his chisel.
The engraver and his wife Virginia started out in Spokane, raising a family near Liberty Lake. But when their children were grown in the late 1980s, they took to the road.
“I think I have gypsy blood in me,” Virginia Hudson said. She said she loved waking up in new cities and seeing so many people.
They spent 11 years living in an RV. Hudson sold his work at knife shows and consulted for a construction company at project sites around the country. He built his workshop in the back of the truck that pulled their trailer.
They were financially successful. But while Virginia enjoyed the traveling, Tom suffered from life on the road. “When you do 12 to 14 hours a day, even though you love it, sometimes you need a break,” he said.
So they returned to Spokane and recently found a home along a peaceful stretch of the Spokane River. Hudson was looking for a change of pace, but found he couldn’t put the chisel down.
Though it seems he would have plenty of customers among the hunters in Eastern Washington and North Idaho, Hudson does business with clients from all over the country.
While he’s doing fewer knife shows, Hudson’s building his business through the Internet. He gets regular orders over electronic mail, and expects to have a Web site running this summer.