The past years, I've steadily been making more and more bows. By now, they are scattered in several rooms, leaning in every corner. Gathering dust, the newer ones in front of the older ones. My bows deserve better. I've long contemplated what kind of display method I would like, and what material it would have to be. There is a
nice topic that shows a variety of beautiful wooden bow racks. I've gained inspiration from that topic, although I also knew I wanted something more special than some of the basic racks. The wooden dowels are too plain for me. All these hand crafted bows deserve something better than pre-fabricated dowels and pine boards. I wanted to use natural wood, preferably with live edge. A few months ago I found a local tree trimmer that has a portable band saw for cutting up logs. He also sells some of the logs he has cut into flitches. I visited the shop and found a few beautiful yew slabs. They were rough sawn, loaded with knots, but I could see the potential underneath. So I bought a few of these yew boards and processed them at home. It took a lot of sanding, carving and finishing. I messed up the first layer of clear varnish, so I had to sand it off and re-do it. All in all it took a lot of time and effort. I probably could have made at least one, possible one and a half, bow in the same time. But the result is so worth it! The rack is about 55" tall and has 14 pegs. Each peg is 5" deep, so it could easily hold two flatbows, maybe even three narrow longbows. So I can fit at least 28 bows on this rack.
