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Crusher's Emporium

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Ottawa, ON
Crusher's Emporium

Unique handmade & remade wooden boxes & other treasures created using a mix of new & old materials.

We offer a broad selection of jewelry boxes, trinket boxes, kits, & kaboodles. We recycle & reinvent lost treasures so you have a place to store yours!

08/07/2026

Another official debut today, this time the latest in my Comic Book Ads series. Well, in truth, the first three in this series were destroyed in our July 1st flood, so currently this is the one and only available in that series, but this is the biggest and boldest yet, so we've got that going for us! The box itself is another auction pick-up. It is velvet-lined, but the real draw of this particular box to me was its curves. Measuring in at 13 1/2" x 9 1/2" x 6 1/4", this beauty features a mix of comic book and Rolling Stone ads from the late '70s, the '80s, and the very early '90s. It makes for some fascinating reading and is an excellent conversation starter!

08/05/2026

Just in time for Ottawa's 200th birthday celebrations, I am officially debuting the first full iteration of my "Vintage Ottawa" print in action! This print collects thirty-three postcards of Ottawa created by the very successful Valentine and Sons Publishing Co. out of Scotland early in the 20th Century. They made a career out of travelling around to just about every city you can think of, taking pictures, and then creating a series of postcards of the area. Seems like a pretty good gig, actually. Anyway, the postcards are available in the public domain now and I took them into Photoshop and assembled them into a single 11" x 17" print suitable for wrapping a box with. The pictures are a fascinating collection of places that are gone, places that are changed, and a few that you can still see today. The box is a vintage shoeshine box that I picked up through an auction sometime ago and it measures 10 3/4" x 6 1/2" x 8 3/4". All in all, it is a fascinating piece to just stare at and explore Ottawa's past!

07/31/2026

Sooo... here's what's going on in the workshop. In an effort to bring something good out of something crappy, I had cut the art out of some books of mine that got damaged in the flood back on Canada Day with the intention of incorporating it into some future decoupage-type project. Interested in workshopping some ideas out tangibly, I needed something physical to put them on, so I went and took a look in my scrap wood supply to see what I had on-hand to work with.
Every box is made up of three basic things, a top, a bottom, and sides. I will use a variety of materials for the top and bottom depending on what I have around me and how I intend to finish the box. In this case, I have a piece of 1/4" poplar for the lid and that would be suitable for staining, painting, decoupage, whatever. (I will also use a thin plywood sometimes, but it is not as great for staining and isn't as classy.) For the bottom, I used a piece of cheap pine that I scavenged off a shelving unit one of my neighbours gave away a couple of years ago. But the key to this box is what makes up the sides which is a piece of 1x6 tongue and groove pine that I cut the tongue side off to attach to the underside of the lid creating a snug fit between the bottom and top. I would also draw your attention to the lines created by the grooves along the sides. I think they give the box a really interesting shape. I have already had a half dozen ideas of how I could decorate this box beyond what I had originally planned, and I am very excited by the potential of its general design, so far as to suggest that it will likely become one of my base designs. And that all happened en route to just facilitating another project, proving once again that if you put in the time, good things will happen.

07/25/2026

Doing an application for a market and they want a single photo that explains what the Emporium offers and mannnnnnn... that's hard to do. I get into so many things that kind of crossover and overlap. Things are further complicated by still dealing with post-flood issues and having most of my stock in storage. Ultimately, this is the one that I went with, but I feel like it only scratches the surface. Will it win the organizers over? To be determined...

07/17/2026

Hey..... remember that print of old Ottawa postcards I was working on? Yeah? And remember that old steamer trunk that a friend gave me a while back? Well, they have found their way to each other. Stay tuned...

07/15/2026

Just to keep you updated... I have just about completed my re-creation of the glass radio dial display for my Victor radio box in Photoshop. I'll get it printed off with my next batch of printing and then it will be ready to become a drawer face! (Whenever I can get around to building said drawer, of course.)

07/11/2026

Soooooo... it's been a bit of go the last eleven days or so. As I am sure you know if you live in the Ottawa area, we had a bit of a flooding issue on Canada Day and our household was hit pretty badly. I won't get into the fine details, because I know many of you out there have been going through the same thing, but I will tell you that we maxed out at fourteen inches of water in our basement and that I live and store most of my creations down there. Not everything was lost, but a significant chunk of what was down there has been. We are working through it... both physically and mentally. However, the only path is forward and in the spirit of that I would like to introduce you to the Emporium's two latest acquisitions. I haven't had much of an opportunity to do research yet, so my details are sketchy at this point, but on the left is a radio from sometime in the 1930's. There are three open spaces on the face that I will ultimately reformat into four drawers (with the bottom space having two). The middle space is where the radio dial display was located and I have started re-creating it in Photoshop to be used as the face of the drawer front. On the right is a speaker of similar vintage. My original plan was to also give it some kind of drawers, however, based upon a suggestion from my brother-in-law, I am also considering making it a place that you could put a wi-fi/blue tooth speaker into. To be determined. I don't currently have a timeline for completion as my workshop is buried by stuff we pulled out of the basement, but I will keep you informed as I think these are going to be really cool.
And to those of you recovering from the flooding, my heart goes out to you. Hang in there.

06/23/2026

Here's a sneak peek at something new brewing in the workshop! As I look to broaden my graphic print collection that I use to decorate boxes, I am taking another dip into the Ottawa pool, but this time instead of building off my own photography, I am going way back to the early 20th century and integrating period postcards of Canada's capital that are now available in the public domain. There are some amazing images of the Parliament Buildings, the Chateau Laurier, and other buildings that still exist today, but maybe more interesting are the buildings that have been lost to the passage of time. The Carnegie-funded public library, old city hall and a magnificent post office... these places are amazing to see and spark the imagination. I am super excited to see how this will turn out!

06/20/2026

Something new and fresh out of the workshop and in my humble opinion, it is my highest achievement in my Ottawa-inspired series yet! Measuring in at approximately 12" x 7" x 9", this sweet little dresser is one that I picked up in a vintage lot a couple of years ago. It is made from a pressed wood product, not actual wood, which is why I opted to paint and decorate it rather than stain it. I cleaned it off, sanded and primed it, and then coated the body in a soft vanilla paint. After that, I custom fit some of my favourite shots from my Ottawa collection of digitally-filtered photos and placed them on the dresser's surfaces. Thematically, I focused on some of Ottawa's (and Gatineau's) distinct and varied architecture. Specifically, this piece features the former Union Station (and current Senate), Kiweki Point, the Rideau Canal, Tabaret Hall at Ottawa U., the National Gallery and Maman, the Canadian Museum of History, the National Arts Centre, the Aberdeen Pavilion, and the Chateau Laurier. Very pleased with how this one turned out and as usual, it's got me thinking about what the next iteration might be.

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