Chuck DavisĬhuck Davis has worked as a specialist in marine and underwater photography and cinematography. So this really was built by a very skilled carpenter not a “do-it-yourselfer.” And there you have it. but could have been older brother Chandler who had evidently built several of these type sinks) and he really did a nice job, the sides were solid redwood planks and the bottom was plywood held into place very precisely via a routered groove in the redwood.
but “repurposing” is even better.Īs I remember, Dick told me that one of Brett’s brothers had built that sink many years ago (I think he said it was Neil Weston. and re-purposed by others, unlike electronic gear that gets a few years old and becomes more or less unwanted and ends up in the e-cycle bin somewhere. It seems used darkroom gear in general tends to get used and used for years and year. I was amazed what an interesting history and how cool is it that darkroom equipment like this can move all around the Monterey Peninsula and render utility like this over the years. Dick then told me that he had in turn been given that sink years ago by his long-time friend, Brett Weston who had printed with this sink for some time, then gave it to Dick when Brett switched to a different sink. Then Dick said to me, “Well you know where I got that sink, don’t you?” and I said “No, I have no idea”. Some weeks later after I had restored the sink, I saw Dick Garrod at the Monterey Sports Center where we both work out regularly and I told him that I had just acquired his old wooden darkroom sink and I was honored to have a sink that was used by him and my friend Brad. As it turns out years previous, he had been given that same sink by Dick Garrod when Dick switched to a stainless steel sink in his darkroom. Brad had given me the gift of this old sink. I then built some legs for it out of 4×4’s and built the height custom to my own height and the height I find most comfortable to lean on occasionally when rocking prints in the trays for long printing sessions. It came out looking great in both form and function. I ended up re-sealing a few seams with Bondo, then gave it three coats of medium gray marine deck paint. A lot of sanding and scraping off of the old fiberglass strips (it took me days working intermittently to get down to the wood, and strip off all the old paint and fiberglass patches) and lo and behold as I began to sand away I realized this sink was made of real vintage 2″x8″ redwood.
it looked pretty ugly, but I needed something to get me going in my newly relocated darkroom, anyway the sink was the perfect size for my new darkroom, so I hauled it home in my truck and went to work on it. The sink was sitting out in the back of his studio, with strips of dried old fiberglass hanging off it, as it had obviously been patched and repaired many times in the past, the drain hardware was rusted and corroded. He said it was probably headed to the dump if I didn’t want it. The sink was pretty beaten up and had been stored outside his place as he had switched to stainless steel sinks. I was helping him move at the time and had donated my truck and labor to help him re-locate over to Carmel Valley. I was given my darkroom sink by my friend, fine art photographer Brad Cole when he moved from his old Seaside, CA location. Today we share a story from our friend, photographer Chuck Davis.
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