About Us 

Our story begins with a young man who was introduced to woodworking in 1970.  After taking just two years of junior high school wood shop, he learned the necessary skills to craft a one-of-a-kind pool table which sold for $400 at the school fair.  That was the year Ken Norman fell in love with the possibility of making things out of wood and he never let go of that desire.

In 1995 Ken and Nicky married and soon after they became a party of five welcoming daughters Caetlyn, Carly and Cameron within a 5-year period.  Over the next 25 years the idea of building a woodshop came up often and Ken would routinely purchase wood tools to do small projects here and there. But always there were more pressing needs and never enough time to pursue his passion.

In 2020 while the world stood still and most were in lock down, Ken and Nicky had an idea. With vacations and travel plans on hold they decided to invest in the wood working dream. That’s when Ken stumbled onto, and became enamored with, CNC machines. CNC, or Computer Numerical Control, is a machine which marries Ken’s affinity for engineering software and a 35-year career in IT with his re-discovered love for wood carving.  He spent hundreds of hours learning about creating wood pieces through this method and soon the whole family, including our son-in-law Joel Thomas (also an engineer), were swept up by the dream of starting a family wood carving business in our hometown of Knoxville TN.

The mission of Whittled is to create beautiful wood carvings honoring people and marking moments - paying homage to the past and celebrating present occasions while leaving behind treasured reminders of life’s sacred moments for future generations.

While we love to work with our clients to capture memorable moments using their own unique designs, we also offer a number of products that you can choose from our online inventory. Each month we will be adding new product lines and items to our inventory. We have listed these items by category for your convenience. And, perhaps best of all, any stock item can be personalized (your family name(s), dates, etc.) for an additional $50

We will also be offering seasonal items over the course of the year - such as Valentine’s Day, Easter, Memorial Day, 4th of July, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hannukah, and other notable occasions. Please come back often to see what’s new - or better yet, join our newsletter and get notified ahead of time!

Check out our full list of products.

FAQs

  • The answer to that question somewhat depends on the design, but the largest item we can currently make is 40” X 30” X 4”

  • First - we recommend only kiln-dried hardwoods as they work much better for detailed 3D carvings. We typically keep maple, walnut, mahogany, and cherry on hand but can use any type of hardwood you prefer (dependent on availability at our supplier)

  • Well, there are a lot of variables to this answer - items in stock will ship next business day. Personalized and custom orders will depend on how long the design process takes, how large / detailed the design is, and type of wood selected. As a general rule, you should expect 3-5 weeks for custom orders from receipt of your design to arrival at your door. These carvings have remarkable depth and detail, but it can take many hours, sometimes even days, on the CNC machine to create. Then, we make sure that finish we apply has had ample time to cure before shipping. We think of ourselves more like a crockpot than a microwave. It may take longer, but it sure “tastes” better!

  • Absolutely! While a sign would be a custom order, the carving process usually takes far less than a 3D carving. The only limit is the sign cannot be larger than 40” X 30”