By Kristen Radford
He doesn''t wear a red coat or black galoshes, but Reid Saxey knows what it''s like to spend all year in a workshop.
This isn''t a one-night gig, and unlike his white-bearded counterpart, Saxey delivers his hand-made marvels throughout the year and throughout the state.
The products: original, personalized, and 100 percent handmade picture clocks, lamps and furniture. These highly lacquered and rustic home accents are not only the products of hours spent in a once-horse-barn-turned-woodwork shop, but also the embodiments of years of hard work, trial and error, and pure innovation.
'I''ve gotten very persistent,' Saxey said. 'You keep pounding on something and sooner or later you arrive there. That''s for sure.'
Saxey said his hobby dates back at least 25 years, when he taught himself the tools of the trade. Now, in his 18th year working for the BYU Paint Shop, Saxey still spends his evenings and Saturdays pasting, lacquering, sanding and assembling his clocks.
Clock-making wasn''t always second-nature to Saxey, and dedication has become essential in his quest for the perfect timepiece.
'It took me three years just to develop a paste that would fuse the picture to the wood and work under the clock''s epoxy,' he said. 'For about three years, I was doing nothing but searching and experimenting.'
The searching and experimenting paid off, and now, tucked in a corner of Wallsburg (a tiny community near Deer Creek Reservoir in Provo Canyon), Saxey''s workshop is a marvel in itself: one room stacked to the ceiling with crude slabs of cottonwood; another corner where every piece is sanded smooth; a long, narrow space where Saxey assembles each clock; and walls covered foot by foot with his innovative creations.
Innovation is Saxey''s familiar companion, and his coworkers attest to his dedication in each of his fields.
'He bends over backward trying to work with people,' said Phil Proctor, assistant supervisor in the BYU Paint Shop. 'He''s pretty ingenious and comes up with great ideas.'
Proctor said Saxey''s best attribute is his extreme patience.
'He helps people get what they really want. He''s very meticulous,' he said.
Saxey''s perfectionism isn''t limited to his clock business alone. During business hours, Saxey supervises BYU''s Sign Shop, a segment of the paint shop located in the Brewster Building on campus. Saxey lends his dedication and creative flair to provide the entire campus with posters, banners, nameplates and road signs.
'One of the mainstays of his good work in the sign shop is his creative ability,' said Larry Woodcox, supervisor of the Paint Shop. 'You have to have a creative talent for signs. I think he uses the same creativity in his clocks and tables and lamps.'
One would have to be creative to meet the demands of his small company. In addition to selling his clocks and furniture in several venues in Heber, Salina, Richfield, Price, Ferron and in Provo''s Sportsman''s Warehouse, Saxey and his son, Gary, spend the holidays selling his goods at Artist''s Corner in University Mall. This will be the sixth year Gary Saxey will run his father''s holiday store. With a background in sales, he has become a partner in the 'Original Picture Clocks' empire.
Gary Saxey said he and his father get along despite mixing business with family.
'We may not have gotten along when I was 15,' he said. 'He used to work me too hard.'
Now both Saxeys are working hard, finding more locations and more opportunities to spread the word about their customized products.
'I think the clocks are pretty neat,' Gary Saxey said. 'I''d like to find more markets for them.'
Oddly, that market is not his father''s own home. With a workshop full of goods and a flair for the rustic, one would assume the Saxey home to be filled with his art.
'My wife likes really girly stuff,' Saxey said. 'You walk in there and it''s all Marie Osmond dolls and Boyd''s Bears.'
Saxey also sells his products online, at www.originalpictureclocks.com.