Unique furniture from locally salvaged trees

When the massive elm tree outside Joan Murray’s Madison Park home came down with Dutch elm disease, Murray and husband Mark organized a wake so the neighborhood could mourn the leafy, 100-foot giant boasting 120 rings. (They counted.)

But Joan Murray didn’t have a plan for the tree’s afterlife — not until Jim Newsom showed up and proposed one.

Newsom owns Urban Hardwoods, a Seattle furniture company that does custom work and builds elegant tables and other pieces using mostly locally salvaged trees. Back in 2003, when Newsom explained his company to the Murrays, he asked for the elm, offering in exchange a custom-built table. The Murrays agreed. Their 4-foot round table now sits near a window overlooking the spot where the tree stood. The rest of the tree went to two homes on Orcas Island, while some lumber is still waiting to be made into tables.

“It’s like good karma,” Joan Murray said. “I love that we can sit at that table and remember the tree