Nutmeg Woodturners League: A Brief History

In 1989, not long after a few artisans formed AAW, the American Association of Woodturners, to promote the craft, a young woodturner named Andy Barnum came to Brookfield Craft Center with a proposal. He wanted the Craft Center to host a group he called the Nutmeg Woodturners League. “It seemed important to create a group where all people who had an interest in wood-turning could meet and share with other turners,” Barnum wrote when the club turned 25. He added, “I was shy and reserved—definitely not naturally inclined to do something like start up and run a woodturning club. But I decided to do it anyway.”
Barnum approached Dee Wagner, the Craft Center’s registrar at the time, who eagerly endorsed the notion of hosting the club. “Dee represented everything good about BCC,” Barnum wrote. “She was caring, giving, and always positive. . . . It would be hard for me to overemphasize just how much her presence at BCC contributed to the successful arrangement between BCC and what would become the Nutmeg Woodturners.”
To get the club organized, Barnum had help from his wife Patti and from Dennis Elliott, who may be best known as the longtime drummer for the rock band Foreigner. Barnum says Elliott “was famous and worldly in his own right. But he was also just a woodturner who wanted to learn and share.”
The club’s first home was in The Barn, in a room over the pottery studio that now houses the modern craft studio. When the Craft Center acquired the Railroad Building, a new turning center occupied half the space. It has been Nutmeg’s home for 20 years as well as a thriving classroom—the only space in Connecticut devoted exclusively to teaching woodturning.
Today, the Nutmeg Woodturners League has more than 50 active members who gather regularly at the Craft Center for meetings where they show their latest lathe work. As you can see from the pieces on display at this show, those members possess a spectacular sense of style and an appreciation for fine craft. Enjoy!