KINGSTON, MA– A surprising entry in a woodworking contest has led to an international creative collaboration between several woodworking industry suppliers and a children’s camp for cancer survivors in upstate New York.

The contest entry came from Camp Good Days, a residential summer camp in Branchport, New York, for children with cancer or those who have (or have lost) a parent or sibling with cancer.

Colonial Saw Company, the U.S. importer of Lamello woodworking tools, ran the 2017 contest among their customers to discover innovative uses of the Lamello P-System joinery application.

Jerry Romanowski and other volunteers run the woodworking program at Camp Good Days for their campers to help get their minds off their treatments, or in some cases, their loss. He cuts wood components in his personal basement shop and brings them to the camp for the children to sand, paint and assemble. Projects include bird houses, keepsake boxes, and step stools. Together they create more than 600 projects each summer.

“I was so pleased to see Jerry’s entry in our contest among many other creative submissions from all over the country,” said Chris Hofmann, Lamello U.S. product manager at Colonial Saw. “It brought his and the camp’s efforts to my attention. I knew that my colleagues at Lamello back in Switzerland would appreciate this particular customer as well!”

However, since campers come from all over the US and the world, getting their projects home on an airplane was a problem in the past. Then, Romanowski discovered the Lamello P-system and the Clamex P-14 connectors, which enable projects to be flat-packed and sent home in their suitcases ready to re-assemble.

Romanowski’s story and the camp’s efforts resonated with Lamello AG, which now supports Camp Good Days with free P-System connectors, tooling, and accessories.

“When I saw their contest entry, I knew they were something special,” said Marco Ress, Lamello International Area Sales Manager. “No child is ever turned away and services are free thanks to the support of many individuals and businesses. Woodworking is in our DNA and we wanted to help them succeed.”

But the generosity doesn’t stop there. Colonial Saw has joined with Lamello’s CNC manufacturing partner Komo Machine, Inc. and Universal Forest Products to help produce parts for the Camp at the International Woodworking Fair in August.

Universal Forest Products will be supplying the wood and Komo will produce CNC-routed component pieces for more than100 campers’ projects live at their booth at IWF (#6734), the largest US woodworking industry trade show. In addition to partially liberating Romanowski from his basement shop, this effort is designed to help raise awareness about the camp.

“It’s a true collaboration between four companies who came together to give children the opportunity to regain some of the fun and camp experience that cancer has taken away from them,” said Hofmann.