Good Life

Rustic Woodworks

Episode TGL-1104

All About

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Wayne Ignatuk lives in the heart of the Adirondack Mountains, where he makes rustic furniture. He grew up in New Jersey but started his career in Florida. It was also in Florida that he met his wife Donna. He eventually had children and started up his own company that manufactured optics and laser crystals. It was successful, but he had no time to enjoy it--one year he even worked on Thanksgiving Day.

Each summer he and his family headed north to their Adirondack cabin to escape the heat. Donna and the kids stayed all summer, while he commuted. They loved it so much they began to want to be there all the time. He decided to sell his share of the business as well as his home and move the family to upstate New York to start a new life. He had no idea what he was going to do for work, but as a child he had helped his father repair furniture. He remembered a lot of what he learned from his father.

He tried his hand at making his own furniture, and when that went well, he decided to test market a piece of his furniture at a friend's shop as a sample. From that came three orders. The rest, as they say, is history. He now runs a furniture business called Rustic Woodworks, which allows him much more free time to spend with his children.