Woodworking is the activity or skill of making things from wood. Examples include cabinet making, wood carving, joinery, carpentry, and woodturning.

We see these in NC in categories including Furniture, Decoys, and Luthier.

The furniture industry in North Carolina has been a major player in the state's economy for over a century. The origins date back as far as the seventeenth century when artisans of English ancestry began to settle across the state, producing simple yet functional furniture on a small scale. Early industrial entrepreneurs and developers focused on the Piedmont section of North Carolina, especially the city of High Point. The area was extremely well-suited for the furniture industry because of an abundant wood supply from numerous hardwood forests, above-average railway and highway transportation opportunities and the availability of cheap labor. By the 1980s, High Point had earned the nickname "The Furniture Capital of the World," and employment peaked at around 90,000 people in 1990. High Point hosted its first regional furniture trade fair in 1909; these events gradually evolved into High Point Market, an internationally-renowned furniture trade fair. Learn more about NC Furniture.

Wild waterfowl provided an abundant source of food for settlers of the North Carolina coastal regions, and early residents often made decoys to lure the birds within range of their guns. Not until the late nineteenth century, however, did decoy making became a serious occupation, when market hunters and wealthy sportsmen exploited the huge flocks of migratory waterfowl wintering in the sounds and bays of North Carolina. Learn more about Decoys.

Luthier is a maker of stringed instruments such as violins or guitars.

Click on the pictures to the left to learn more about Woodworking.