AFRICAN BLACKWOOD
This crochet hook is made from AFRICAN BLACKWOOD. This hook is shaped with a larger handle to relieve stress on the hand and wrist when crocheting. The hook has an Ergonomic shape that fits nicely in the hand.
The crochet hook measures 5 3/4" to 8" long depending on the size of the hook and is 3/4" to 1" in diameter at its widest.
General guidelines are sizes
Sizes K (6.5mm) and smaller are 5 3/4" to 6 1/4" long.
Sizes L (8mm to M (9mm) are 6 3/4" to 7 1/4" long.
Sizes N (10mm) and larger are 7 1/2" to 8" long.
Hooks with multiple woods tend to be to the longer side of these measurements. The reason for the variation is that each hooks is hand turned and while the standard shape, which gives the Ergonomic advantage, is maintained each hook is uniquely it's own.
You can request a specific length please contact me before ordering a custom length.
Because this hook is handcrafted there will be variation in appearance, grain and color. No two Hooks will be the same! Pictures are examples of what you will receive.
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It is a small tree, reaching 20-45' tall, with grey bark and spiny shoots. The leaves are deciduous in the dry season, alternate, 6–22 cm long, pinnate, with 6-9 alternately arranged leaflets. The flowers are white, produced in dense clusters. The fruit is a pod 3–7 cm long, containing one to two seeds.
The dense, lustrous wood ranges from reddish to pure black. It is generally cut into small billets or logs with its sharply demarcated bright yellow white sapwood left on to assist in the slow drying so as to prevent cracks developing.
Good quality "A" grade African Blackwood commands high prices on the commercial timber market. The tonal qualities of African Blackwood are particularly valued when used in woodwind instruments, principally clarinets, oboes, transverse flutes, piccolos, Highland pipes, and Northumbrian pipes. Furniture makers from the time of the Egyptians have valued this timber. A story states that it has even been used as ballast in trading ships and that some enterprising Northumbrian pipe makers used old discarded Blackwood ballast to great effect.
I find this wood to be one of the hardest to photograph. But on the the most beautiful to turn.