Arbutus (Traverse), Michigan 3D Wood Map | Laser-Cut Birch Depth Chart
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.
- SurveyReal bathymetric sounding data sets every contour line before a single cut is made.
- CutEach depth band is laser-cut from its own sheet of Baltic birch, up to nine layers deep.
- StainWater layers are stained by hand, reading darker the deeper the water runs.
- StackThe sheets are registered and stacked in sequence, and the bed's true shape rises out of the wood.
- EtchDepths and place names are burned into the grain itself, never printed on it.
- FrameA solid Baltic birch frame and acrylic glass finish the piece, ready to hang.
The Arbutus chain southeast of Traverse City, carved in Baltic birch at 16 by 20 inches: five connected lakes threaded through state forest, each basin cut one depth contour per layer.
Arbutus is Traverse City's backyard secret, a string of small lakes linked by channels narrow enough to paddle through with your hands. Much of the shoreline runs through the Pere Marquette State Forest, which keeps the water quiet and the mornings misty, and the no-hurry channels between lakes are half the point of being out there. On the chart, the chain reads as a series of small birch basins joined by threads at the surface layer, a shape no photograph of any single lake can show you.
Each contour is laser-cut from its own sheet and stacked by hand, with names engraved into the wood, acrylic glass over the relief, and a solid Baltic birch frame.
People with a cottage on the chain can trace their whole summer route across this chart, lake by lake, channel by channel.
Traverse City sits just northwest, and the region's bigger waters are minutes away: Grand Traverse Bay and, beyond it, the whole Northwest Michigan chart.
- 16 × 20 in
- 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
Live from the water