Florida Woodturning Symposium

…the largest turning event in Florida!

Brian Rosencrantz

View Bio     View Video Intro     View Photo Gallery     Brian’s Demo Handouts

I began woodturning when my father purchased a Craftsman single tube lathe. I was about eight years old at the time. I remember the first items I turned were billy clubs turned from two by fours. I didn’t turn much wood for many years though I worked in a machine shop for several years where I did metal turning off and on with just the occasional return to my father’s Craftsman. In 1995, after moving to Florida, I met a member of the Palm Beach County woodturners at the South Florida Fair. Big Jim Forrler was there turning logs he had picked up at the side of the road on his home-made lathe. When I realized what was going on I returned home and began turning wood I too picked up, on my father-in-law’s Shopsmith.

When I next saw Jim, I took some of the pieces I’d made, and he invited me to attend a meeting of the Palm Beach County Woodturners. Under the tutelage of club founder Al Gruntwagin and other club members I rapidly became involved in both turning and serving as a board member and officer of the club.

I enjoy all aspects of woodturning, but I am best known for pushing the boundaries and doing challenging pieces. Many of my pieces are turned, cut apart, reassembled and turned again. Some of my pieces show the influence of the years I spent studying archaeology and doing fieldwork in Peru. I enjoy embellishing my pieces with carved, burned, and colored surfaces. I like incorporating other materials like leather, bone and stone into my pieces. I enjoy collaborating with fellow woodturners and other artists. My work has been featured twice in American Woodturner magazine.

I spend several weekends every year demonstrating woodturning at Yesteryear Village at the South Florida Fairgrounds in West Palm Beach. I have turned and given away thousands of wooden tops to visitors to the fair. To me the most fun and rewarding part of turning is demonstrating our craft to non-turners. They are always amazed and delighted by the process. And hopefully I will plant a seed in the minds of a select few of them who will go on to preserve our craft after I am gone.

Therming

Turning with the axis of rotation outside of the workpiece isn’t new. It’s been practiced as a production method for centuries. It allows you to make shapes you might not think came from the lathe. But did you know you can make your own therming jigs? Plans and how to make therming jigs for working between centers and on a faceplate. Examples of shapes and projects. Turning a multi sided vessel.

Reifendrehen Turning a Christmas Village

A modern American twist on a classic German craft, Ring Turning. This is a simple project to provide an introduction to the techniques involved and how they can be adapted to modern US available tooling and materials.

A Square Bowl from a Round Lathe

Not a round bowl with a square rim, this bowl is square on the inside and on the outside from top to bottom! It’s impossible, you can’t turn a square inside on a round lathe. That’s what they said. But it all depends on how you look at it. This project forces you to re-think how you create on the lathe.

Incorporating spouts and handles into your vessels

Using folded construction and “lost and found wood” you can incorporate these design elements into the structure of teapots, cups, and other vessels instead of sticking them on afterward or carving the whole outside of the work.

Brian’s Demo Handouts:

Therming
Spouts and Handles

Brian’s 2026 FWS YouTube video intro: