Michael Koppy has been working in the skilled trades all his life. First as a tool maker building precision tooling in the manufacturing industry for over a dozen years. Then teaching manufacturing at Lake Superior College for 29 years. During this time, he was also building high end furniture in his own shop and selling furniture grade lumber. After retirement from teaching, he started building furniture full time and hired a full-time apprentice to work with him. He has taught and taken over 30 classes at Marc Adams School of Wood Working to further develop his skills. In the last 15 years he has purchased equipment to harvest trees that needed to be removed from property. The wood was used to build heirloom quality furniture for the property owner’s home.
Laser Engraving & Woodcraft Services
About the Owner
Minnesota native, Jason Owen Soderlund, has nurtured a lifelong passion for working with wood. While living in LA he worked as a guitar luthier for Electrophonic Innovations, where he discovered his love for different finishing techniques as well as Shou Sugi Ban (wood charring) and wood dying. Jason developed his hand finishing skills using oil and shellac finishes. Since his return to Minnesota in 2020, he began building fine furniture with his mentor, Michael Koppy in Hermantown, where he’s learned many old world and high tech woodworking skills. During this time he has developed his own shop and runs a professional grade laser engraving machine, with which he engraves not only wood, but also glass, slate, leather, and acrylic as wonderful vehicles for personalized laser engraved products.