There’s a magic in wood that doesn’t call to everyone but nevertheless has a hold on most — even when they don’t understand what has drawn their attention.
It could be a custom-made piece of furniture, a fascinating fallen log or an ancient beam holding up a historic roof.
For Matt Morgan of M2 Lumber, sharing that magic with those who feel its pull is a journey that began in childhood and is still emerging, tree by tree.
Woodworking wonders by M2 Lumber
Like many craftsmen, Morgan’s love for woodworking was nurtured by a father whose patient example engendered a passion he had to walk away from to discover. Even as he imagined other futures while pursuing an engineering degree at Clemson, he found the allure of working with wood was buried bone deep.
“It’s not anything I’d definitely planned on doing for a career or for my life,” Morgan said. “What drove me to engineering was the creative aspect of it — liking to make things, understanding how things work, liking to be able to build things.”
Though his interest and education propelled him into the manufacturing field — in which he still does consulting work — the call of one of the oldest building materials known to man remained. The path to answering that call was not linear or intuitive but driven by necessity.
About a decade ago, when Morgan was newly married and needed the essentials to equip a new home, he remembered his father’s workshop and the skills he learned.
“The first things that I made were absolutely terrible,” Morgan said. “It just kind of exploded from there … and then it just kind of slowly, over time, took over our lives.”
Business building
Morgan’s woodworking grew into a business slowly, like the trees on which it relies. He and his young family found a historic property in Hickory Tavern in Laurens County. The property afforded him the space for an expanded workshop, which, in turn, allowed him to acquire and install the equipment for a commercial lumber mill.
Over the following decade, Morgan developed a business that gave an outlet for his history and creative drive, M2 Furniture Co., and one to further his endless fascination with wood’s potential, M2 Lumber.
Both are rooted in the uniqueness and inherent character of trees and the lumber they produce. Pointing at the various projects and distinctive timbers with which they are made, Morgan described how grain and color tell a story only a caring craftsman can reveal.
Morgan and his team of three transform both purpose-cut and salvage timber into the material skilled hands transform into heirlooms.
“When you make your own lumber, you have a very deep understanding for how organic wood is, and how and why it moves the way that it does,” he said. “It’s so fun running a sawmill because it’s almost like — I tell people it’s like opening up Christmas presents — because when you’re cutting into a log, you have no idea what you’re going to get in there.”
For more information about M2 Lumber, visit m2lumber.com. For more information about Morgan’s custom furniture, visit m2furnitureco.com.
