By Libby Hopkins
Up-cycling and recycling are becoming the norm nowadays, but Jason Olson of Write Turnz in Lithia is taking recycling to a whole new creative level. Olson’s business takes recycled, refurbished and reclaimed materials and turns them into beautiful pens. He was even creative in coming up with the play on words for his business’s name. “It was a well thought out play on words because I like things that have meaning and it throws people for a little bit,” Olson said. “Once they’ve thought about it, it becomes clear on what we do.”
Olson got into making pens after a friend of his got a lathe, which is a woodworking tool. He would hang out in his friend’s garage on the weekends making different crafts and pens. Finally, one weekend his friend asked him when he was going to get his own lathe and start making his own pens. Write Turnz was born. Olson loves creating pens that have special meanings to his clients. One of his customers recently asked him to make pens for him to give to his groomsmen for being in his wedding. “We made the whole set of pens out of old wood that was sitting in his grandmother’s basement in Virginia,” Olson said. Another project he is currently working on involves French oak that was reclaimed from France and that ties into a story of how the Marines got the name “Devil Dogs” during WWI. “The pens I really like to work on are the ones that have meaning to someone,” Olson said. “The colors stand for something or some event in their life.”
Olson and his wife, Sarah, take their pens to various arts and craft shows and farmer’s markets all over the Brandon and Tampa Bay area. They also have a stand at the FishHawk Farmer’s Market. Keeping things local is very important to the couple because everything they use to make their pens comes from local materials. “Local is my customer base and the majority of the pens we make are for people from our community,” Olson said. If you would like to learn more about the pens Olson makes or if you would like to have him create a personalized pen, you can visit the Write Turnz website at www.writeturnz.com or call Olson at 486-3426. For a listing of the different farmer’s markets and craft shows Write Turnz will be at, you can check out its Facebook page at www.facebook.com/WriteTurnz.
