News

Mar 18, 2025

Apprentice woodworker sees his craft as artwork

Pate Neal asked for divine guidance and found his creative calling Pate Neal asked for divine guidance and found his creative calling Pate Neal asked for divine guidance and found his creative calling

Pate Neal asked for divine guidance and found his creative calling

Pate Neal asked for divine guidance and found his creative calling

Pate Neal asked for divine guidance and found his creative calling

Two years since graduating from Alamogordo High School, Pate Neal is right where he wants to be -- selling his remarkable woodwork at the 10th annual Rio Grande Arts and Crafts Festival this weekend.

His short journey from working at McDonald's to making cutting boards that he sees more as art than craft is all about looking inward and knowing what to ask for in his prayers.

"I knew there was something missing in my life and things were going wrong because of what I was doing," Neal said. "So I asked for a clear path and I asked to understand more what's going on."

The very next day, his uncle called to say that a woodworker friend named Thomas Thorp -- who Neal had worked for as an eight-year-old sweeping up sawdust -- was in need of an apprentice, and his prayers were answered, he said.

Pate Neal wasn't making cutting boards yet, but he was working with his hands, which is what he wanted to be doing.

"I really enjoy working -- working with my hands is one of the most important skills you can have as a young man," Neal said. "I really enjoy it."

Neal's cutting boards are sold under the label Kärve-Ware. The intricacy and imagination that goes into his work can sometimes cause potential customers to balk at the price, he said.

"Usually, it's like, it's too much money for a cutting board. The difference is, yeah it's a cutting board, it's utilitarian, but it's a work of art," Neal said.

Considering the caliber of his woodwork after just two years as an apprentice, it seems likely that he's just getting started.

"I enjoy it, and I don't plan looking back any time soon," Neal says.