Lisa Pavelak and Rob Pineo
Lisa is a Safety Professional holding the designation of CRSP. She currently works on special projects in Safety and Human Resources for the Nova Scotia Government. With Lisa, everything is about safety, order and following systems correctly.
Lisa has dreamed of having her own business, and being a former Boston Marathon runner and champion Iron Man competitor, her business had to involve physical work. Moving logs and hardwood lumber are taking care of that requirement!
Rob is a practicing trial lawyer with Patterson Law in Halifax. His areas of practice are commercial litigation and expropriation. Rob grew up on a farm in the country and has missed being a "country boy". Now he works at the mill on Saturdays and enjoys the hard work.
About us
About The Company
The Hardwood Tree is the creation of Lisa and Rob and involved over a year of planning and a year of work getting the physical structures and equipment in place. The mill is located on the land that Rob's great-great-great grandfather received as a Crown Grant for his service in King George III's army in the American Revolution.
The core foundation principles of the Hardwood Tree are in the company's motto: Local, Responsible and Sustainable. Rob and Lisa are committed to using local trees, labour and components. The goal of the company is to respect the trees used and the ecosystem from which they were harvested. Currently, the company acquires its logs from Conform Ltd., Jack Brown Ltd., Peter Sibley and our own forest. In no case do the logs travel farther than 35 km from where they were grown.
Lisa and Rob built the millhouse and kiln, along with their son, Matthew Shapleigh, themselves, without any professional assistance. The millhouse is a 14' x 22' "pole barn style" building made of Nova Scotian lumber. The ceiling is opaque fibreglass to maximize the use of natural light, thus reducing the requirement for electricity throughout the daylight hours.
The kiln is a wooden structure that will be used to "finish off" the lumber after it has naturally air dried. The kiln does use electricity for its power source, but because the company uses the natural air dry method for most of the drying, the electrical requirement is reduced by over 90%.
The mill is now operational and the woodworking shop will be up and running by April 1, 2016.
