Get the drift of design

Driftwood art is a well known art-form, but only a handful of people practise it these days due to difficulty in collecting raw material. When used in home decor driftwood sculptures add the raw appeal of Nature to your home. Technically speaking a driftwood is a piece of wood that has drifted along a river or a stream. These can also be found on beaches of a sea. It can be a burl or a natural root or a simple piece of wood. These pieces while drifting along a river or a stream hit stones and boulders enroute to assume stunning shapes. These also face different weather conditions and get stuck at some destination from where they can be collected for final sculpting. During this long and hazardous journey the real texture of the wood is exhibited for it to be transformed into an art piece.

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The Himalayan Rivers and streams contribute unlimited stock of naturally shaped wooden pieces during floods; these pieces can also be collected from the wild, usually from inaccessible and dangerous places high up in the mountains and the embankments of rivers where wind plays an important role in giving them unique and natural shapes. It is also to be seen that how destructive forces of nature play artistic games to create unique shapes of birds, animals, reptiles and humans on this canvas of wood.

It is seldom that one comes across a piece of driftwood in a complete form, and it is here that the artistic eye of a person can make all the difference. Unlike other forms of art, each piece of driftwood is unique.

Though it is advisable not to have any joints in the driftwood specimen, but by doing so, one can have unlimited options to create stunning pieces. One way of decking up your home with driftwood sculptures is to buy these from exhibitions or sales outlets. But one can also try one's hand at creating these pieces on one's own as no special tools are required. A novice can just start off with any piece of wood and gain some practice in chipping with a hammer and a chisel along with some experience of cutting with a saw.