Sequim Gazette staff

Tim Wafstet’s business is branching out.

For the past eight years, Wafstet has been hand-crafting cedar goods in his home carpentry shop in Diamond Point.

Wafstet utilizes locally grown and locally harvested cedar to build an ever-expanding range of products, from arbors to plant stands to benches to pedestals.

He says using Pacific Northwest cedar just makes sense: It helps the local economy, he said, and it has historical roots. “The Native Americans used it in their ceremonies,” he said. “It’s fair to say it was a very sacred wood.”

He says the cedar also makes scents: “It’s very aromatic.”

Put on a pedestal

Wafstet just started building cedar pedestals, which can be used as plant stands or end tables or what-not.

Though they’re constructed of substantial slabs of cedar, they start at just $49. That compares remarkably well, he said, to some cedar veneer products available on the web, which can run as much as $300.

Wafstet also makes food service pieces, including the custom serving dishes used by the Dockside Grill on Sequim Bay and the “cooking planks” that are booming in popularity for both home and restaurant use.

Many of the trays and other serving pieces are finished in mineral oil and beeswax, he said, providing “an all-natural finish” that can be used for serving prepared foods.

Other pieces, including the indoor benches, are coated in polyurethane, which provides sufficient waterproofing for interior use.

The outdoor benches are finished with deck stain to prepare them for the peninsula’s sometimes nasty weather.

Cedar is the wood of choice, Wafstet said, because it is more resilient than fir or other native woods. “That means it lasts a heckuva lot longer,” he said.

Wafstet noted that in the old days, before fire concerns ruled them out, locals used cedar shakes for roofing material to take advantage of the wood’s toughness.

These days it makes great window boxes and flower pots.

For more information, drop Wafstet a line at timwafstet@msn.com or friend “The Cedar Box” on Facebook.

And be sure to drop by the open house Wafstet has scheduled at his Diamond Point shop from 10 a.m.-

3 p.m., Saturday, April 7.

In the meantime, Wafstet’s work can be seen and purchased at Sunny Farms, The Red Rooster Grocery and the 7 Cedars Casino Gift Shop — and, soon, at Sequim’s Open Aire Market.