Every piece that leaves this workshop has a small carved mark on its underside. It's not decorative. It's not primarily about brand recognition. It's a record: who made it and when.
The mark is applied with a small brass stamp, heated briefly and pressed into the finished wood. The heat scorches the surface slightly, leaving an impression that stays legible through years of handling and re-oiling. It's the same principle as a hallmark on silverware — not proof of quality in the sense of a certificate, but evidence of origin. Someone made this, and that someone is identifiable.
Why this matters to us
Lena started the stamp practice in the first year of the workshop. Her reasoning was simple: if someone has a question about their piece five years from now — a question about re-finishing, about whether a crack is structural, about the wood species — they should be able to trace it back to us, and we should be able to trace it back to a specific period of work.
We keep a log. Not a detailed production record — that would require more administrative energy than we have — but a simple notebook with the date, the piece description, the timber batch reference, and which of us made it. The stamp links the physical object to the log entry.
In practice, questions come in more often than you'd expect. A grandmother who received a piece as a gift three years ago wants to know whether she can clean it with soap and water. A father wants to give a piece to a second child and wants to know if it needs refinishing. These are reasonable questions and the stamp means we can give a specific answer rather than a general one.
What the mark looks like
It's small — about 8mm in diameter. A simplified linden leaf shape (Lübeck's tree, as it happens) with a year code alongside it. 2024 pieces have a different year code from 2026 pieces. If the mark is worn to the point of illegibility, the piece is old enough that the information in the log may not be retrievable — but by that point, the piece has likely been through enough handling to answer most questions on its own.
We don't put it anywhere visible. The underside of the piece, or a recessed surface. The mark isn't meant to be seen during play — it's meant to be findable when someone turns the piece over and looks.
Some people who order custom pieces have asked whether we can put the child's name alongside the mark. We do this when asked — carved alongside, not stamped. The name goes in a different position from the maker's mark so the two aren't confused. The name personalises the piece; the mark documents its origin. They're different things, even if they end up on the same surface.