Documentary
30’
The Sled Maker
The Sled Maker
Meet a dedicated craftsman
who, in his seventy-eighth years,
is still engaged in striving for
perfection.
Genre
Lifestyle
Production year 2010
Material
DigiBeta, int. sound without
narration
Director
Per Harald Kårstad
Produced by
NRK
Distribution
Nordic World AS
It is a long way from a cramped little cabinetmaker’s shop in Oslo to gruelling
trail dog sled races in Alaska and northern Norway. Since 1975 Thorleif
Nordengen has been building dog sleds in his backyard workshop. Time
and time again Robert Sørlie, Norway’s premier dog sled driver, has been
first across the finishing line with one of Thorleif’s sleds. Meet a dedicated
craftsman who, in his seventy-eighth year, is still busily engaged in striving
for perfection. Thorleif is one of the last practitioners of the dying art of
cabinetmaking left in Oslo. He started when he was 24, and many are the
shops he has fitted out and select pieces of furniture he has made since
then. But in 1975 something happened to divert him. ‘A cousin came in
with a “Nansen sled” and asked me if I could repair it. I had long yearned
to make something I could call my very own, but I never dreamed that it
would be a dog sled,’ he laughs. Now the OT sled, a high-tech marvel in
duraluminium, fibreglass and carbon fibre, is a byword among those who
know. Thorleif has never done any dog sled driving himself, but for 25 years
he has worked closely together with Robert Sørlie. More than 4,000 OT sleds
have been dispatched from his workshop to render sterling service the world
over. But Thorleif builds more than dog sleds. His toboggans, trim, ultra-fast
constructions made from 22 layers of birchwood and mahogany, are in a
class of their own. ‘If I were to have my time over again,’ says Thorleif, ‘I’d do
just the same. There’s nothing to beat the art of cabinetmaking.’
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