Ridgway Record File Photo
Rick and Randy Boni, both who have been carving wood masterpieces for 20 years, initially came up with the idea that evolved into the Ridgway Chainsaw Carvers Rendezvous, a week-long event showcasing the most prolific chainsaw carvers from around the globe.

Event to celebrate 10th anniversary. 

By Joseph Bell

Record Staff Writer 

The 10th Annual Ridgway Chainsaw Carvers Rendezvous will be the foremost event in its already rich history.
According to Liz Boni, co-founder of Appalachian Arts Studio and organizer of the internationally acclaimed carvers event, the milestone will showcase talented artists from around the globe.
“And it’s our 10th year and every year, people think ‘it’s going to be canceled,’ or ‘they’re not going to have it,’ but every year we probably say that because it’s so much work but this is our 10th year, it’s our big celebration and we’re definitely going to do it,” Boni said. “It’s just been an extreme amount of work. Last year, we had 220 registered but I think only 187 came, it snowed quite a bit last year. So far, we’ve got about 50 registered, which is pretty par for the course. I do know The Royal Inn is completely booked for that week.”
The next Rendezvous is scheduled for Feb. 21-28, 2009. However, the event’s inception was a modest one.
“It started, Rick and Randy (Boni) have been carving for 20 years, and probably in 1996 they started to wonder if there were other people out there doing this,” Boni said. “So they had heard of a few people and a lot of them come like ‘Wild’ Bill Drohn (Centerville, Pa.) and Brian Sprague (Venango, Pa).”
According to Boni’s recollection, there were nine carvers for the initial gathering.
“Of that nine, I think four of them have passed away. It was about three or four years later, that they said, ‘oh, let’s do it again.’ Some of the carvers that were there said they wanted to do it again and that it was a lot of fun,” Boni said. “Denny Beach (Wapwallopen, Pa.) and a couple other ones, so Rick and Randy (Boni) decided to see if they could find some carvers to do it again.”
However, one paramount occurrence for the popular event was the heightened popularity of the internet.
“The internet came out, so right around that time, it’s a techno-art form and with the technology coming, I think the formula really brought it together and it really worked. When the decision was made to do the Rendezvous, the timing was right,” Boni said.
And according to Boni, a modest innovator, the numbers have flourished.
“We thought 30 carvers was an awful lot of carvers,” Boni said. “50 was the record of any gathering of carvers, and to think that we have surpassed that and gone to 100, and 150 and 200 carvers, that’s just overwhelming.”
Using worldwide communication, carvers from around the globe are able to better communicate thanks to the humble Ridgway event, which has become local lore in only 10 years.
“We’ve created an industry through the Rendezvous and a forum was created for the carvers to go online and share their ideas and it’s really a continuation. Because of the forum, I think there are three or four other forums that have splintered off of that and the events that have happened worldwide have been phenomenal,” Boni said. “When we started this, there was not very many chainsaw carving events, and if there was one, it was mostly on the west coast. Mostly demonstrations or a quick carve and you had performance carving at the fairs but you never had a whole bunch of carvers, and now you’re getting competitions that are really center stage.”
One prime example is Echo Outdoor Power Equipment.
“Echo (Outdoor Power Equipment) Corporation has come on board and they’ve been a sponsor of the Rendezvous in the past and now they’ve gone on and created their own ‘Echo Series,’ the ‘Carving Series,’ and Zoe (Boni) took fifth in that this year, we were very, very proud of her and from that, she went to Germany, and took third,” Boni said. “So she’s really up-and-coming as a carver and with traveling the world like that, that is why our slogan is ‘life exceeding the dream,’ because never ever did we think this would happen.”
But Boni said she admits that realizing the dream is a daunting task in itself.
“Logistically, it’s kind of a nightmare with the lodging and places for people to stay and stuff like that but it’s like anything else, we’re adaptable human beings and we make it work and the carvers love that,” Boni said. “The hardest parts are also the most attractive parts and the carvers like that, they like how it’s not conventional and there’s not one big hotel where everybody stays at.”
Boni said the incoming carvers adapt to the Elk County town.
“In Ridgway, they’re staying in different places and they’re making friends with people. We do get different people who donate their camps or space in their homes and we definitely acknowledge Father Ted because we fill up the rectory and the convent (at St. Leo’s Catholic Church) with the international carvers because the hardest part is finding lodging for the international carvers because they can walk where they need to be because providing transportation becomes very difficult, especially 8 a.m. in the morning and maybe 11 p.m. at night, whatever it is that they want to do,” Boni said. “It’s a matter of setting everything up, getting all the food ready, to ensure that everyone is cared for and no one is left behind. When we started this, we told the carvers that ‘if you can just get to Ridgway, we’ll take care of you,’ and we still hold by that and there’s a lot of carvers - I don’t think people realize how famous they are in other places - and some of these carvers command a phenomenal amount of money per day to be somewhere, so for them to come here, that also attracts the new carvers who then can come here and learn from them.”
The extraordinary event in turn casts Ridgway in a dazzling brilliance.
“It’s still a place and it’s still a relatively new art form and we think everyone knows about it, but I don’t think so, so we still try to push it forward as an art movement and Ridgway is extremely famous, and it’s known as the mecca for the carvers. It is the epicenter for chainsaw carving,” Boni said. “It’s really quite popular around the world, it is amazing. We found out from one of the japanese carvers that there is a store called ‘Ridgway,’ in their town in Japan. So that’s neat, that’s really exciting, and that’s one of their traditions, to name something after a town that has been really inspirational or has meaning in their life.”
However, with the accumulation of carvers flocking to the area on a yearly basis, Boni said costs have become an issue.
“I think last year, the auction brought in $46,000 or $47,000. In the beginning, when we started this, there wasn’t a lot of carvers and it wasn’t so hard because a lot of things were donated to us. Now, with this many carvers and the logistics being as they are, not a lot of things are donated anymore,” Boni said. “The event has become rather costly, but it’s paying for itself. It was not a lot of money in the beginning, but it has become extremely costly. We’ve been very lucky that we’ve had enough to pay for the event and, in the past, we’ve been able to donate to the YMCA and the Make A Wish Foundation and, over the years, we’ve probably donated maybe $80,000 and that was when there was roughly 150 carvers.”
However, with current industrial trends, prices are risen perennially.
“But after that, then things started getting expensive. The wood and the t-shirts started to get expensive. Sponsorships, we started to get less sponsorships, but thankfully, the event pays for itself, and that’s a good thing,” Boni said. “We put about $70,000 back into our community in 10 days through the things that we buy and purchase for the carvers so I think, all in all, it’s an economic blessing.”
Based on last year’s event, Boni said numbers are seemingly on the rise.
“I know it brings people in. I know we didn’t bring 20,000 people in here last year because of the weather but we did have more people sign up for the auction than ever before so that does tell me that there are diehard fans there that will come,” Boni said. “But if you have 20,000 people and most of them spend $10, $20 in town, that’s a good day, that’s a real good day.”
And with the winter approaching, Boni said she is now in constant preparation for the Rendezvous.
“I’m working on a few things and I can’t say for sure what kind of differences or improvements we’ll have. Being that it is our tenth year, we hope to make it memorable. I’m working on the seminars and seeing who we’ll have,” Boni said. “There are two every morning, Monday through Thursday, they’ll start at 9 a.m. and end at noon. The schedule will stay the same because it works, and Friday will be carving all day. The auction will start at 1 p.m. on Saturday, as usual, and we’ll go from there.”
With the global event on the horizon, Boni said that, looking back, the Rendezvous has exceeded expectations.
“It’s been a wonderful experience and the Rendezvous will continue to evolve into what it is and what it’s supposed to be, and where it goes is where it’s supposed to go. Now that we’ve created this, this art form and art movement, it really moves,” Boni said. “I see it evolving and changing into whatever it needs to be and whatever it’s supposed to be.”