Share a part of the life of our collaborators by discovering their hobbies! This month, let's talk about Michel Jurine, consultant for our Advisory business unit, and his passion for woodworking.

What is your double life?

I love working with wood in all its forms, from the construction of large structures (for example a carport or a "wood yard"), to the realization of small objects in fine woodworking or turning (boxes, pocket bowls, ...).

When and how did you start?

Since I was a little kid, I always "bugged" my dad by taking his tools to "waste" nails and pieces of wood to build knight swords or sets for my toy soldier battles (there were no video games back then... 😉).

But I got serious about it after my studies, when I was able to set up a workshop in my first house: buying the first tools and electroportable equipment, then installing workshop machines before investing, a dozen years ago, in professional machines (wood combo, band saw, lathe, mortiser, routers, etc.)!

What do you like about this hobby?

Without a doubt: being in contact with the material. And the magic of transforming it from a raw state, to a "tamed" state, not to say "domesticated". Besides, wood is a material that keeps a life of its own, under the influence of humidity, light, temperature... or even small bugs or micro-fungi, for example 😉

This teaches me to create, to use what nature has already produced and add a functional utility or an artistic side to it.

I also like to give new life to deteriorated objects, trinkets or furniture, to which it is necessary to replace an element (a molding, a handle, ...), or to apply a more "surgical" treatment (replace a turned leg of old table for example).

And in your daily life, how does your passion fit in?

In two very different ways:

• The first takes the form of "big projects": the carport for example, a structure built in beams and rafters, which had to be conceived as a complete project in response to a defined need, has precise mechanical constraints, must be able to withstand meteorological hazards for example, yet should be elegant, so as not to be limited to a "plain" roof on 4 posts...
• The second one is much freer: after an intense day, an evening of woodturning in the workshop, starting with a plane tree head that turns into a cup.

I really like this second approach which teaches you to work in a totally different posture from the professional one, sometimes in a completely intuitive way, without any method, without any objective, by letting yourself be guided by what the material reveals as the tools work... It's tiring for the wrist, but it's a great way to rest your head!

Have you acquired skills that you use in your professional life?

The concern for observation, for the environment, for the problem, for the team, for the project on which we intervene. Like a material that we work with, the environment reacts and we must constantly adapt to it to make it evolve in the desired direction.

The "agile" mode of operation at its finest... from an initial idea to its implementation, sometimes in the form of a prototype, often through a succession of trials and errors.

Or, on the other hand, to produce a series of complex objects, for example, the design and implementation of templates, a manufacturing range, a rigorous sequence to achieve a reproducible result corresponding to a specific need.

And then a certain sense of pedagogy, the satisfaction of transmitting a know-how or an expertise and of accompanying progress and the acquisition of sensations which guarantee an intense satisfaction as soon as one obtains results, however modest they may be...

Thank you Michel for answering our questions!