Traditional Barrel Making Will Leave You in Awe! VIDEO

In the South-Eastern Carpathian Mountains, amongst rich forests rarely visited by humans, wonderful rural settlements had evolved within the valleys and lowlands, generated by the restrictive relief as a natural barrier. This is the  Land of Vrancea, one of the most active seismic zones in Europe, a picturesque landscape in which are protected natural monuments of special beauty: the Natural Park Putna Vrancea, Tisita Gorges, the Alive Fire from Andreiasu de Jos, just to name a few. Take a tour, and you will find yourself in a place right out of an old story, with shepherds taking hard journeys leading their sheep to the highlands and oxen being commonly used for farming activities. Now, about how the endangered crafts have been preserved in the area, one particular village has drawn our attention, Nereju, an ancient town well studied over the past century by teams of ethnographers. Like in the old days, local resources, especially wood, wool, and skins, are still used by local artisans. We drove our car up the steep slopes of a mountainous terrain until we reached the end of the road. A few more steps up the slope, right on top of the mountain, lives an incredibly talented and passionate cooper. His name, Starueala Maricel, is well known all across the neighboring villages and further, for traditional barrel making.

We were welcomed with joy by his wife, Lambreta Starueala, who is the kindest, most sweet, and loving person, and, because soulmates usually have similar personalities, I knew at once, that Mr. Maricel had to be at least as positive as she was.

Looking from the front, nothing seemed to announce the presence of a great master cooper barrel maker in there. Just the usual: a neat garden with rows of vegetables, perfectly aligned, flowers, a beautiful house, and a guesthouse, but once we came to the backyard, we were greeted with a surprise: a sawmill, and piles of wooden planks freshly sawn up and piled in the yard, and the soothing smell of green wood.

The cooper was already hard at work, tapping in the workshop. He welcomed us with an open smile. The workshop was inside a large outbuilding, and it was very well organized to fit different tools and barrels of all sizes: jugs, cheese barrels, churns from 10 to 20 kilos, and even large wooden containers from one to three tons. The family has a tradition in woodworking, inherited from their forefathers, who specialized in traditional barrel making.

„As a child, I watched my father’s every move, but he rarely let me help him. As I grew up, my curiosity grew even more intense, and, by the time I got twelve, I would break into my father’s workshop to practice what I saw. When he caught me, he decided to teach me this trade,” remembered Mr. Maricel.

While working, the cooper had all kinds of tools nearby: stave splitters to cut green staves, draw knives to shape the staves, planers to level the staves, saws, hammers, and cooper’s knives to bevel the edges. He has been a full-time cooper since childhood, working hard to provide for his family and ensuring his children’s education. When it comes to work, he is earnest and devoted. As a person who loves his job, he agreed to make a demonstration on traditional barrel making and immediately set to work on a 10-kilo cheese barrel. 

„The wood must be air-dried for two to three years before being made into a barrel. The freshly cut staves are left outside to dry for at least two years to prevent cracking. I use spruce wood for my barrels,” he said while picking a few well-dried staves from the piles he had outside.

The cooper sat at the shaving horse and used his drawknife to shape the staves.  Then, with a planer, he leveled the edges.

The barrel was put together once the staves were done and the hoops formed. He simultaneously grabbed the staves and raised them to create the barrel. All hoops were placed in a graduated sequence. With a cooper’s knife, he beveled the edges before he cut the groove with a croze, into which the bottom was inserted.

A man of exceptional craftsmanship, with manual skills that are increasingly hard to find these days, Mr. Maricel never rested for a moment, his eyes fully focused, his hands moving up and down.

At times his wife popped in to call us at the table. She cooked for us a savory, flavorful, wild mushroom stew with hot cheesy polenta and delicious doughnuts. She is a good woman, always there to support and help her husband whenever he needs her – whether to wind the sharpening stone or to hold onto the large hoops while his husband raised the staves to form a large container. 

To make the bottom, a measurement was taken by walking the compass around the inside of the groove to create six equal movements. This set the distance between the two points as the radius of the bottom circle.

He then led us to the basement, where he had kept rolls of beech ribbons needed to form the lid.  He chose one the right size for his barrel and cut a hole in one end, then the other end was cut so that the two ends interlocked, forming a wooden hoop that was knocked around the barrel’s head, forming the lid. The barrel looked so neat you could tell it was made by a machine rather than handmade. No sooner had he completed the cheese barrel, than he brought some staves to make a water jug. (to be continued)

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