ABOUT HARDWOOD CLOCKS
In 2006, Hardwood Clocks Owner, Charles "Max" Maxwell, retired after 25 years as an officer in the U.S. Navy. Armed with a self-taught knowledge in mechanical engineering, he married his unquenchable appetite for fine woodwork and his lifelong attraction to all things mechanical to launch Hardwood Clocks. Max has no formal clock training, only a fascination and passion for old-world, wooden clocks that began when he visited a museum store at Cape Cod in 1982 while on honeymoon with his wife Pat. That is where he first saw a six-foot, exposed gears, skeleton clock constructed entirely of American Walnut.
The impression that this one-of-a-kind work of kinetic art made on him was so lasting that he decided to dedicate his first post-navy career woodworking project to designing his own version of that beautiful clock. It took the better part of nine months to design his first working, all-wood clock, from the ground up. The M-2, fondly referred to as the 'train-up' clock, and the M-3 clocks were the outcome of that intense effort. He has since received and satisfied numerous requests to build clocks for private owners. Public interest in these clocks has driven Max to redesign and perfect his all-wooden gear drive trains and is now dedicated to improving the aesthetics of his numerous designs.
Max has designed and built over a dozen different clocks since 2006. You can read about these clocks and how they are created from bulk hardwood to finished clock in the 'work-in-progress' blog section of this website.
