About Us

Norfolk Wood Shop is dedicated to bringing high quality tools, supplies, lumber, gifts and education to makers of all levels of experience at the best prices possible.  We’re a small independent business consisting of only three people: James, Mallory, and Nevis.  If you buy something from us, you are directly supporting our livelihood and customer service is handled directly by one of us.  If you give us a ring or message us on social media or email us, it will be one of us three getting back to you. We are committed to doing our part to make woodworking as accessible as we can regardless of race, sexual orientation, age or any other reason. Not only do we aim to have the best prices, but we are even trying to have high quality used tools available as much as possible to make woodworking more financially accessible.

The Right Solution

One of the main goals of Norfolk Wood Shop is to help people avoid buying the wrong thing. When getting started in woodworking, it is so easy to think you need one tool or another, and sometimes it's hard to know when to spring for the best of the best, or when the economy item will work just as well as the high end item. An easy illustration of this is anyone who has ever bought a router table imagining that they will have both a router table and a hand held router–most of us come to realize quickly that once that router goes in the table we’re never removing it and the cost of owning a shaper table could be similar–it’s the right purchase for some and a very wrong purchase for others.

Lumber

The large majority of lumber and live edge slabs we carry are locally sourced right here in Virginia. We don’t import because we aren’t big enough to verify the ethics or sustainability of overseas lumber and because there are so many beautiful species right here, quite literally, in our backyards and small locally owned mills who are dedicated to providing excellent quality lumber for us and our customers.

Local Art

We also wanted to create a place that makes it easy for local artists to sell their creations. We have personal relationships with all of the makers in our gift section.  None of these items are imported.  All of them are handmade here in Virginia. We wanted to be able to connect makers with people who may be looking for something completely custom and unique for them. If a local maker wants to focus on the MAKING part, we will handle the rest after they have handed off their masterpieces. We do take a cut, but most of the proceeds go directly to the individual who made them.

Curated Supplies

Everything in our shop has been carefully curated for exactly these reasons mentioned above and we hope to continue growing our offerings to both our local community and nationwide. We give serious preference to US manufacturers and even greater preference to other small businesses. It’s true for the resin and pigments we carry, many of our finishes, our lathe gouges, and many other products in our lineup.  At the time of writing, we have over fifty-two distinct brands carried here at our brick and mortar.

The Future

As time pushes onward, Norfolk Wood Shop will continue to expand our inventory with a few high quality names, including a few diamonds in the rough we never would have known about without research as well as recommendations from our customers. We have plans to open our own tool line as well, focused on small set up jigs and other shop aids that make life easier. We are continuing to roll out new events, and expanding upon those to not only include our “Make It, Take It” series, but will also be rolling out product demos, date night ideas, and more classes. Keep up with us to find out more as we bring these fresh ideas to life.

Our Commitment

We’re not here to push anything on you. We’re here to listen to what you need, and hopefully provide a solution that gets you where you need to go. If we don’t know the answer, we’ll do our best to help you find one. If you like what we are doing, and like supporting your neighbors and local craftsmen and women, drop in and say hi. Tell everyone you know that we’re here. The only way we’ll stay around is with your help.

Thank you in advance, to all our neighbors and friends who support us.

Everything is wood now!

~ James