By Kathy Kreiger
Sentinel staff writer

It's a chair that invites you to sit down, put your feet up and let your troubles drift away with the sunshine.
The chair's lines are classic, the wood well sanded. The color is that mellow blend or earth and fire that must have astonished the first person to cut open these gaints and see the hues inside.
It's a redwood chair even Julia "Butterfly" hill might approve of.
And if you think redwood patio furniture can't be evnironmentally friendly, the man who make the chair would love to meet you.
"I've been working with redwood since the 60's, when I was a fence contractor," says Tom Schot, Santa Cruz Native, self described type A personality, and proud grandfather. "I'm a redwood person."
These days, he's still in the redwood busineess, but from a different angle: Most of the wood he uses is recycled.
Water or vinegar tanks, barns, old houses and even fences. You name it, he's found it, arrived ahead of sledge hammers and bulldozers, and taken it off to build chairs, tables and benches.

"We're not cutting down the old growth (trees)," Schot says, "There's plent of second-growth. There's plenty of tear-down.
"And if you make something out of it, you give it a whole new life."
The first sign it's going to be a fun interview are the rows of Frisbees lining the wall of the small woden office behind the showroom, which is filled with redwood benches, chairs and tables.
Each Frisbee is printed with the name of a disc-gold tournament dating back for years. It's another of Schot's interests.
The good omens pile up like a big south swell hitting the beach at high tide on a full-moon night:
The big, bronze-colored Weber barbecue next to the table saw. The photos of the grandkids in the low-tech newsletter. The rainbow-colored butterflies chasing each other on the computer screen-saver. The semi-retired, semiconductor industry businessman who bikes in to mentor the owner because he has fun doing it. The 20-something kid with a friendly smile, who offers his killer barbecued skirt steak recipe, as he assembles a redwood garden table he says will last 30 years - longer than he's been alive.

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