Collection: Cedar Mountain Studios

Cedar Mountain is our love story. It goes like this. Boy meets girl. Girl meets boy. Boy (Don) is a theatre designer from Winnipeg with a burning desire to make and sell wooden birds. Girl (Suzanne) is a teacher in training from Vancouver with no ideas whatsoever about wooden birds. Boy and girl go on a date, share a bottle of wine and their hearts crack open.

And that's when the Cedar Mountain story started … when we fell in love but we are getting ahead of ourselves.

We did what in love people often do and got married, bought a house in Vancouver (back when normal people could still afford to do that) and had three fabulous children (Erica, Aubrey, and Amy). The flying wooden bird business expanded and succeeded. We had 40 employees, a busy factory and were selling our products in big-name stores. We worked double shifts seven days a week, lived in the fast lane, and kept up with the Joneses.

We came to Salt Spring Island for a getaway in January 1993 and decided to move. (Ask any Salt Springer and you’ll find that this part of our story isn’t uncommon). We started looking for a house before we even knew if there was a good local school. When we drove up the driveway on Thomas Road we knew this was our home before we even got out of the car.

Soon after, we closed our studio in Vancouver, packed up our kids, hopped on a ferry and launched Cedar Mountain Studios in a new location. Three children were raised and two grandchildren were born. Dogs were welcomed.

Almost forty years have since past, and we’ve made thousands upon thousands of products in our backyard workshop and this company is still at the center of it all. Operating a successful business on Salt Spring Island is part of our story. It’s very personal. It’s frenetic. Every single thing that leaves our studio is authentically us. It's absolutely overflowing with passion and made with love.