The Thunder Bay Carvers attempts to create an environment that gives support to carvers as individuals and also to the carving community. Carvers from Thunder Bay have often been big winners at the Prairie Canada Carving Competition.
The group has about 95 members at present ranging in age from late teens to late 80's. We have all skill levels from beginners to award winning carvers. We are almost split equally for men and women. We have several members from the surrounding Northwestern Ontario area. We all enjoy sharing our love of carving. In 2008 the group celebrated it's 20th anniversary.
Membership is open to anyone. Guests may attend a meeting free to see what the group is about. Membership fees are $25 per year for an individual or $40 per couple (CDN).
We meeting monthly on the 3rd Wednesday from September to June at 7pm in the basement of Our Saviours Luthern Church at the corner of Farrand and River Streets.. In June we often have a windup BBQ if the weather is good. In December we have a Christmas potluck. Our monthly meetings consist of a short business section then a program of either carving or a presentation.
The group has tackled many big group projects in the past few years including our carving quilt which is on display at our Community Auditorium and our most recent project, the Christmas tree raffle which raised almost $16,000 for the Little Lions Waldorf Center's Big Boreal Adventure project - a nature trail for children. For the past few years we have also done pumpkin carving demonstrations at various venues to raise money for the Thunder Bay Regional Food Distribution Center who in turn supplies the food banks.
Each year we also do several display/demo booths at local fall fairs. These are always popular and people love to see what we do. At Hymers Fall Fair we also get the kids involved.
We also try to run courses for carvers at all levels and also bring in well known out of town instructors for special courses.
So please check out the pictures on our website to see what we are about.