The quiet dance of carving

British-born green-wood carver Samuel Alexander works from his open-air workshop in rural Czechia, shaping freshly felled timber entirely by hand with just an axe, a hook knife and a straight carving knife. Intuitively guided by the grain, he crafts each object through patient strokes, without sandpaper, until the surface is impossibly smooth. “There’s something I love about watching the form emerge – like it’s revealing itself to me,” Samuel says. In collaboration with AGOBAY, he has created an exclusive matcha pouring vessel, precisely sized to hold water for one cup. Each begins with a split in the log, then is hollowed, carved and finished with five coats of natural tree-sap lacquer, embodying his meditative approach and deep respect for wood.