Artificial black heartwood

This was the first attempt at re-creating the unusual effect of the strong contrast between heart wood and summer wood in the lignum vitae blanks I bought to make the set of 6 cups. Subsequently I cut square sticks of different kinds of wood, so many of the goblets pictured on this site are made in this way. In the 80's I also cut pieces of the same wood and then glued them up again, trying to 'book match' them - but these effects are much subtler and not as overtly attractive