–ON HOLD FOR VAL from Wisconsin 10/7/2016–
–Please do not add to your cart —

Here’s a nice large hand hewn elm fireplace mantel timber. This one has lots of character in the color. American elm is not as stable over time as our usual white oak. So, this one has some significant color variation. Some people  love it and call it charm. Others listen to their mothers about not having anything nice to say. We could overcoat this mantel with a darker finish. It would make the colors less dramatic. The spot on the front has what is called “spalting.” The bowl turners just love that stuff.

On the other hand, the flowing grains of Elm are wonderful. You can see this wave of grain pattern on the front. The ax marks are pleasant and not overbearing. They date back to the 1800s.

There is also a significant chip out of the front right corner of this mantel beam. Because of that, we discounted the price by $75.

This mantel beam is another one of those funny pieces that was re-used from a first generation barn into a second generation barn. We see this fairly often where it is clear that they took down one building, and re-used the wood in the next building. Because this one is hand hewn, it dates back to the late 1800s around here. However, we found it in a barn that dated back to probably around the 1930s.

The original barn was located near New Ulm, Minnesota – a strong German community. In fact, some German POWs were housed near the town in World War II. Based on the style, the use of round nails, machine turned pegs and pine beams, this barn was probably built close to 1930. It did have a few reused timbers from a previous 1800s vintage barn.

This beam is priced at $115/LF. We can cut the beam down and reduce the price by $9.58 per inch up to a $115 discount. Shipping is $65.