Cypress knee whimsical house

I had this 13'' tall chunk of cypress knee at home forever and couldn't figure out what to carve out of it. My girlfriend got me an idea of a house on the hill with stairs around it and suddenly the piece just made a perfect sense. The finished carving is named ''Philosopher's Home'':

Heron carving in cypress knee

Another custom made work, this time done in cypress knee.

It is 12'' tall Heron carving done in one piece, the base has about 5.5'' in diameter.

It has been a long time since I carved cypress knee last and this project was also the very first where I agreed to carve an interpretative bird (or animal for that matter) based on realistic shape and features.

I decided not to carve legs as those would be very thin, rather I chose to use more artistic approach to the base. I must admit I looked up how other carvers approach heron carvings and found my own way as the progress went.

 

The wood has some natural ''flaws'' on the surface as seen in the following picture, those just really add to the character of the cypress knee carving. 

Cypress Knee Clock (no 2)

A table clock carving done in 13'' cypress knee, the chain was released during the carving process:

Dwarven wizard

June 2011 / Cypress knee clock

I guess this is quite an inovative idea: