Woodcraft of Richmond launches five-day kids woodturning summer camp

Woodcraft of Richmond put youth instruction on a real turning schedule this month, not a one-off demo. Kids Woodturning Summer Camp with Kevin Sontag ran June 15-19 at 9862 West Broad Street in Glen Allen, with five days, five projects and students ages 10 and up.

The camp met from 1 PM to 4 PM each day and was priced at $195. Woodcraft billed it as a hands-on program built around real tools and real skills, and that framing matters in a craft where the first hurdle is often not making a cut but learning to trust the lathe, the tool rest and the tool path.

The structure of the week showed why a five-day camp can do what a single demo cannot. The opening session focused on essential shop safety, tool handling and an introduction to how a wood lathe works, giving young turners a way to make the machine feel understandable before they ever chased shavings. From there, the class moved day by day through turning projects so students could build confidence through repetition instead of being rushed through a crowd-pleasing pass at the machine.

Woodcraft’s listing pointed to a custom turned pen, a handcrafted pizza cutter and a hardwood ice cream scoop among the projects. Two additional turning projects rounded out the week, giving each student a sequence of small wins that fit the rhythm of youth instruction: short enough to finish, specific enough to teach, and practical enough to take home. That kind of progression is what turns a nervous first-time visitor into someone who can stand at the lathe with some confidence.

The Richmond woodturning community already has that pipeline in place. Richmond Woodturners, a chapter of the American Association of Woodturners, says its mission is to provide education and information to people interested in woodturning and to promote the craft as an artform. The group meets at the Woodcraft store on the third Thursday of each month, which makes the Richmond location more than a retail stop. It is a working hub for the local turning scene.

Kevin Sontag also appeared on Woodcraft’s June calendar for an adult Date Night at Woodcraft on Friday, June 12, from 5:30 PM to 8 PM. That mix of adult and youth programming gives the store a clear role in the region: introducing families to turning early, then keeping them connected as skills grow.

For woodturning, that is the real value of a camp like this. Five projects in five days do more than fill a summer week. They build the safety habits, tool confidence and early success that make the next generation want to keep coming back to the lathe.