From Nicaragua with love.
Estevan's Lindsay Heier and his wife, Amanda, have had dealings in South America for the better part of two decades. Now they are bringing their creations to Canada to add more support to the people of the second-poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Heier is an Estevan local originally and graduated from the Estevan Comprehensive School.
He and his wife run Timeless Furniture, a company in Nicaragua that manufactures various items out of hard woods, primarily mahogany and Brazilian cherry, harvested in the Nicaraguan jungle.
Heier said his business model is to create unique, hand-crafted and high quality pieces.
Not only does 10 per cent of all sales go to a missionary institute in Nicaragua, but he uses highly-skilled locals to craft everything from dining room tables to mirror frames.
Heier calls the furniture, "classical designs for for a castle."
The works are made via custom order, and they don't skimp on material. He mentioned a dining table that sits 16 people weighed about one tonne.
The pieces are all built of hard woods, not plywood.
"Some of the heavier woods have a very beautiful grain," he said. "You get a series of different kinds of woods. The wood is like fruits in Nicaragua."
The fruits differs between here and there, as does the wood.
"With the wood grains, it's something very exotic. It's nice to bring that beauty to Estevan."
Because the furniture is so unique and carved by hand, not run through a machine on a production line, the pieces slowly become priceless.
"It doesn't depreciate. It automatically becomes an heirloom as soon as it is bought," he said.
Heier said it was his religious side that kept him working in the poor country for so long. A sense of social justice and being able to train and give 25 people jobs in the shop as carpenters and carvers are what he considers fulfilling his "call to evangelize" in that country.
He repeatedly attests, "Life is about dreams. Life is about fulfilling dreams."
Heier went to Nicaragua after graduating university in 1992. He taught theology at a Catholic school and eventually met his wife. While in the country, he also did mission work at an orphanage and delinquent jail. He was later a dean at the Ave Maria University in southwest Florida.
He received a master's in 2000, and originally intended to pursue a Ph.D, but decided to change to a doctorate. He said as a result of this change, he had an "unplanned sabbatical."
This is how Timeless Furniture started.
Amanda is an architect and he said she had always wanted to design furniture. This is one of those dreams Heier said he felt needed to be fulfilled. He said they drew up a simple business plan and then his brother asked if they could design and built all the furniture for a new house he was building in Trinidad and Tobago.
Heier is now studying to be a deacon, and he is developing the Centre for Catholic Missions in Nicaragua, which he calls a missionary institute for carpentry and trades. The site of the missionary building is on a coffee farm and they are in the process of registering as a non-profit organization in the United States. Construction on the site is ongoing.
The first shipment is in Canada now and on display at the St. Joseph's Prayer Centre Bookstore and Gift Shoppe in Estevan.
