Mr Stewart has been an artisan woodworker in the township for the past five years, creating furniture from primarily unseasoned timber, dried during the making process.
"You're using the wood from its raw state. Almost everything I do starts with the log. I enjoy it partly for ecological reasons, and partly for the quality control," he said this week.
"The creative and design aspects are a central motivation."
Every piece starts with a green log, which is split lengthways into wedge-shaped billets.
Great care has to be taken to account for wood shrinkage.
"The log is split with a maul and wedges along the grain, rather than sawn through, as that keeps its strength better," he said.
"To take something right through from its raw state to its finished state is very tactile and satisfying. There are also a lot of traditional skills I enjoy mastering."
Mr Stewart hand-crafts stools, chairs and benches using local, renewable hard woods and traditional tools such as froes, side axes, drawknives, inshaves, gutter adzes, travishers and a foot-operated pole lathe.
"Working with wood is something I've grown up with and have always done. My great grandfather, grandfather and father were all woodworkers."
Mr Stewart originally trained as a psychotherapist but was inspired to explore heritage craftsmanship by the philosophy of artist and writer William Morris (1834-1896), who instigated the British Arts and Crafts movement in 1880.
He later read a book about green woodworker Mike Abbott and travelled to England in 1995 to take a workshop with Abbott.
"I did some intensive training with Mike in the Hertfordshire woods under canvas for a couple of weeks."
Mr Stewart returned to New Zealand and eventually moved to Lawrence in 2005.
"The Gateway Gallery helped me get a market originally, then I started getting more and more private commissions," he said.
"I have a few basic designs, which I vary, as well as designing and making one-off commissions from clients' ideas."
The time, craft and heart involved in creating hand-crafted furniture infused it with a special charm, he said.
"People like the touch of the human hand and the imperfection that comes with that, because it gives it such a unique quality."
"But you have to have a passion for it [woodworking], as you're almost living as an artist in a garret, with not much money. It's very labour intensive. You can't poke a lot out."
