Even in the 18th century, though, ivory was expensive: it was only within the reach of the most well-heeled customers. Around 1820, an alternative was found in the form of tagua, the nut of the ivory palm tree (macrocarpa being the principal species of the five in the genus Phytelephas). The ivory palm grows across the Andes, starting in southern Panama and continuing through Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Brazil and Bolivia, but most prodigiously along the Magdalena River in Colombia. It tends to grow in groves, crowding out other trees, lives up to a century, and reaches as tall as 65 feet.

The nuts range in size from walnuts to hens’ eggs, and the dried meat of the ivory nut is indistinguishable from ivory itself, except to the trained eye or chemical test. It also works and carves identically to ivory.

Today’s most common name, “tagua,” comes from the language of the Indians who live along the Magdalena, who still gather the nut. In the early 19th century, it was known in England as the “corrozzo nut,” but spellings in old texts vary. “Corozo” is a common one.

Tagua’s Historical Impact

Although the size of the nuts is a limitation, there are workarounds. Today, we have glues that will bond multiple pieces together; the Victorians threaded multiple pieces together to fabricate thimble cases and needle holders, as vegetable ivory threads very well.

In addition to these items, when the first tagua nuts reached England in the early 19th century, they were enthusiastically crafted into toys, cane heads, knickknacks and ornamental turnings. Starting in Schmollen, Germany, in 1860, factories were established throughout Europe and North America to mass-produce tagua buttons. The worldwide demand became so great that ivory palm plantations were established in South America. Most of their output went to buttons, which are turned, albeit by sophisticated machines. In 1887, it was estimated that three million nuts were required to supply the factories of London and Birmingham, England, alone. One of the biggest button producers, the German American Button Company, was established in Rochester, New York, in 1893. It survived long after most of the other tagua button companies had switched to plastic or gone out of business.

In the 20th century, plastic began to displace tagua, but early plastic was brittle and did not take to hot irons well. Still, improvements in plastic came fast, such that by the 1930s the tagua plantations fell into neglect and the jungle took over.

Tagua Today

Today, turners and the art world are again revering tagua. Available from Craft Supplies USA and Amazon for about a buck apiece, ivory nut is great fun to turn, carve and scrimshaw — just like ivory. It leaves the elephant, however, alive and well.

The only drawback to vegetable ivory is that about 95% of tagua nuts have a fissure at the center, ranging from mild to severe. Learning to work around (literally) this problem is problematic at first, but you soon get handy at maximizing the yield.

To make the nut into a small vessel, it is useful to think of it as an egg. If you examine the nut, you will perceive that there is a bump where it was attached to the tree, which marks one end of the long axis of our egg. You want to make this the mouth of your miniature bowl. At the other end of this axis you need to sand a small flat spot — about the size of a dime is good. This can be done with a disc sander, a piece of sandpaper on the bench or a coarse file. You now glue the nut to a level glue block on a faceplate with medium cyanoacrylate glue, centering as best you can.

You can now use normal spindle turning techniques to hollow out and shape your miniature vessel. A spindle gouge will work fine, but it needs to be very sharp and will dull more quickly than with wood. Tagua loves scraping, and small, sharp scrapers with a good burr will shape and smooth beautifully. You will hit the fissure; the objective is to turn this away. You now shape the outside to the shape of the inside, leaving a thin wall. Sand to about 400-grit, then polish with a very small bit of cloth and fine automotive polishing compound. The result will be spectacular!

You can also drill a hole through the long axis of the egg, forming a tube. You can now join that to other such tubes by gluing or chasing threads between them. A modification of this idea is to turn a vessel, then make a tight-fitting cap out of another nut to form a small box.

Try Miniature Slabs

Another approach is to cut the nut into slabs using a backsaw, scroll saw or band saw. If using the band saw, it is best to make the aforementioned flat spot, glue the nut to a length of wood, and use this strip as a handle to do the band sawing safely. Once you make the first cut, you can work around the fissure and get nice slabs. The slabs can be glued to a flattened glue block to make buttons, inlays and escutcheons.

You can cut very nice patterns in vegetable ivory with chatter tools. With wood, chatter work can only be done in end grain, but it can be done anywhere on the surface of a tagua turning. Ivory nut can also be scrimshawed, the same as real ivory. Turn what you want to scrimshaw — a button, escutcheon, etc. Bring it to a good polish, then draw your idea lightly in pencil. Next apply any wax onto the surface and buff well. With a sharp, pointed scriber, scratch your pattern into the vegetable ivory. A sharpened awl works fine. Now rub some India ink into your drawing. The wax will prevent the ink from adhering except where you have scratched.

Turning tagua is a nice change from wood and can be done in any lathe, no matter how small. A hard-to-find, but fun, read that can serve as an additional resource is the out-of-print book All In A Nutshell: The Story Of The Vegetable Ivory Nut by Shirl Schabillon.

Above all, I heartily urge you to buy some vegetable ivory and go nuts with your lathe — pun intended!

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One Board is All You Need

You can build this stool from a single 1×10, but if you’re using #2 pine from the home center, like I did, I’ll suggest spending the extra three dollars for an 8-ft.-long 1×12 instead. Even when you pick the best one of the pile, you’ll still need to do a little squaring, straightening and cutting around knots. If it turns out your board is nice enough, you can make two step stools: one for the house, and one for the shop!

First, taking the knots into account, crosscut three pieces to rough length: one at 16″, one at 18″ and one at 20″. These will be the stretchers, top, and legs, respectively. Joint and square up the long edges before cutting these parts to their final dimensions. When you rip them to width, leave them about 1/32″ oversize, so you can sand or plane off any saw marks. Cut the top to final length at this time, and crosscut the legs to 10″. With the table saw blade tilted to 8˚, crosscut the top and bottom of the legs parallel and to a finished length of 9″. In addition to adding some style, angling the legs gives the stool extra stability.

Mark a vertical centerline on the legs. On the top of each leg, measure 3″ out from either side of the centerline, giving you 6″ between the stretcher notches. To make the shoulder cut for these notches, I used my table saw with two miter gauges connected by a sturdy fence, angled 8˚ to match the angle at the top and bottom of the legs.

Now, to make the cheek cut for the stretcher notches, you’ll need to use two rip fence settings, so you can make a cut along both faces of each notch. You’ll make two cuts for each notch, eight total cuts. Once you’ve set the fence for the first cut, rip just a little ways at a time, checking the underside of the board after each cut. When you reach the shoulder cut, turn off the saw and clamp a stop block to your rip fence at that stopping point. Make the four cuts possible with this fence setting. Change the fence setting, flip each notch over to cut its other face, and you’ll come close to cutting the entire joint. Finish cutting the notches by hand to remove the remaining waste.

Next, you’ll give each leg a pair of feet. Start by drilling a 1/2″-diameter hole on the centerline 2-1⁄2″ up from the bottom. Make a mark along the bottom edge of each leg 2-1⁄2″ away from either side of the centerline, and connect these marks to the 1/2″ hole.

Cut along the layout lines using a band saw or jigsaw. To finish off the leg shapes, cut their angled sides and use a block plane or sanding block as needed, to remove any saw marks.

Bandsawing Legs

The simplest machine for this job is the band saw. Make the cuts by eye, following your layout lines.

If you don’t have access to a band saw, a handheld jigsaw will work fine, too.

Making the Stretchers

Rip the two stretchers from the remaining board that you cut earlier. Cut the stretchers’ angled ends at 22-1⁄2°. Now mill the 8˚ dadoes using a dado blade in your table saw. Be careful that these dadoes are angled correctly, relative to the angled ends of the stretchers. The correct direction is to have them angled opposite to, not parallel with, the angled ends of these parts.

Cutting Angled Dadoes

Be picky about sizing these dadoes to the right width — too narrow and the legs won’t fit them; too wide and the fit will be sloppy, which defeats the purpose of the dadoes in the first place. Aim for a good, snug joint connection.

Assembling the Stool

With all the cutting done, go ahead and apply any edge treatment you like. I routed a chamfer around the top board and a 1/8″ roundover on everything else.

You can assemble this stool using just glue or glue and finish nails. However, for maximum strength, I recommend going with glue and wood screws. If you plan to paint your stool in several colors like I’ve done here, do that now on all surfaces that won’t need glue, while the parts are still fully accessible. (If you decide on a clear coat like varnish instead, that can wait until the very end.) Proceed with the assembly by attaching the stretchers to the legs. I counterbored all of the screw holes to set their heads below the surface. Now place the leg assembly upside down on the bottom face of the top board, center it, and drive screws through the stretchers to attach them to the top.

I covered the screw heads with decorative mushroom buttons. While they usually fit tightly in counterbored holes so as not to require glue, it’s a good safety precaution anyway: loose buttons could end up in inquisitive little ones’ mouths, ears or noses by mistake.

With the screws capped, your stool project is ready to make step-up tasks easier for just about everyone.

Click Here to download a PDF of the related drawings and Materials List.

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Featuring:

Workbench: This heavy-duty bench from Sandor Nagyszalanczy combines designs from traditional benches, meant to support hand tool woodworking, with elements that support a contemporary work style that incorporates portable power tools.

Spade Bookcase: Spade-shaped inlays, a secret dovetail drawer and locking miter joints make this Arts & Crafts styled bookcase a rewarding shop challenge.

Classic Step Stool: Made with just five boards of home center lumber and an afternoon of shop time, this handy little home addition gives a step up to those who need it.

Chairside Caddy: This single-drawer box handsomely holds what you need next to you. It’s created on a scroll saw, and the drawer pull is designed to resemble a fishing lure.

Jigs & Fixtures:: Need to spray occasionally but no need (or room) for a spray booth? This knockdown turntable gives you 360˚ access to your workpiece.

Techniques: Learn six different methods for cutting circles – plus how to avoid saw marks on your final piece.

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