Lake Leelanau, Michigan 3D layered wood map in laser-cut Baltic birch, shown framed against a light wall
Lake Leelanau, Michigan 3D layered wood map in laser-cut Baltic birch, shown framed against a light wall
Lake Leelanau, Michigan 3D layered wood map in laser-cut Baltic birch, shown framed against a light wall

Lake Leelanau, Michigan 3D Wood Map | Laser-Cut Birch Depth Chart

$ 188.00
13.5 x 31 in
Baltic birch, hand-stained water
Up to nine laser-cut birch layers
Carved bathymetric relief, laser-etched labels
Soundings: NOAA nautical survey data
How the Water Becomes Wood

A chart is a stack of flat sheets until the water's real soundings tell it what shape to take.

  1. SurveyReal bathymetric sounding data sets every contour line before a single cut is made.
  2. CutEach depth band is laser-cut from its own sheet of Baltic birch, up to nine layers deep.
  3. StainWater layers are stained by hand, reading darker the deeper the water runs.
  4. StackThe sheets are registered and stacked in sequence, and the bed's true shape rises out of the wood.
  5. EtchDepths and place names are burned into the grain itself, never printed on it.
  6. FrameA solid Baltic birch frame and acrylic glass finish the piece, ready to hang.

Lake Leelanau runs long and slender down the middle of its peninsula, and this 13.5 by 31 inch chart matches it, North and South halves joined at the Narrows, every depth contour cut in Baltic birch.

The lake stretches over 20 miles through Leelanau County wine country, pinched to a channel at the village of Lake Leelanau where boats slip under the bridge between the two halves. South Lake Leelanau is the deeper water; North Lake Leelanau runs toward Leland, where the Carp River drops through historic Fishtown into Lake Michigan. On the chart, the two basins carry their own stacks of birch with the Narrows a single bright pinch between them, the whole peninsula's spine rendered in wood.

Layers are laser-cut one contour at a time and stacked by hand, names engraved, acrylic glass over the face, solid Baltic birch frame.

Vineyard weddings, morning skis before the wind comes up, the bridge at the Narrows: whichever Leelanau is yours, it is on here.

Leland and Fishtown sit just beyond the north end, with Suttons Bay over the hills to the east. The bay side of the peninsula is on the Grand Traverse Bay chart, and the shoreline drive past all of it is the M-22 chart.

  • 13.5 × 31 in, matched to the lake's long profile
  • Solid Baltic birch frame
  • Acrylic glass front, ready to hang
  • Free next-business-day shipping on orders placed by 2 PM EST
  • 14-day returns
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