The Future of Woodworking: Guillermo Rodriguez

The workshop in the south of Spain, where Guillermo Rodriguez builds his exquisite boxes is in a small hexagonal cabin built by his sister and inspired by Mongolian yurts. Space is tight. “Not having a larger workspace has influenced my focus on smaller pieces,” he says.

But he also admits, “Since my beginnings, I have had a weakness for boxes, and boxes within boxes.” His beginnings as a boxmaker and full-time woodworker, however, go back only four or five years. Before that, he spent six years living in a van he had outfitted as a camper, traveling around the country pursuing the sport of rock climbing. “Spain is a paradise for this,” he says.

And for some years prior to that he worked as a professional photographer. He shot stills on film sets, architectural photos, press shots for a newspaper, street photos. Wood was central to his experience as a student at a Waldorf…