Kauai-born master woodturner Robert Hamada had a story for every one of his pieces. If you were lucky enough to find yourself in his presence, he might show you a bowl, describe the moment he came upon the fallen tree, point out how the grain of the wood told the tale of every rainy season, storm and drought the tree had known, and maybe let you run your finger along the edge, smooth as skin, hand-polished and radiant.

After Hamada died in December 2014 at age 93, his daughter, Ann Hamada McLaughlin, inherited all of his bowls.

“He saved the show pieces — the best ones — for his estate and he regularly declined offers from major museums, saving them for the family,” McLaughlin said. “Guests to our home who came to purchase bowls were privy to the ‘for sale’ collection, which was on display in the living room. If he really liked them, the meeting extended for hours as he would go to his bedroom, bringing back piles upon piles of these show pieces — not for sale, just for looking — just to show them what he could really do.”

McLaughlin has been slowly, thoughtfully, placing Hamada’s most prized bowls in museums. His pieces are in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Detroit Institute of Fine Arts, the David and Ruth Waterbury Collection in Minneapolis and Yale University Art Gallery, to name a few.

But there was one special bowl, Hamada’s favorite bowl, that McLaughlin wanted to keep in Hawaii.

Made from milo wood, the ceremonial bowl, called a lidded umeke, is big: 17 inches in diameter and 11 inches high. “The lid matches the grain of the bowl and perfectly sits atop the work. The wood is flawless,” McLaughlin said. “It was the bowl of his career.”

During Hurricane Iniki in September 1992, that bowl, which was kept in a wooden crate Hamada built, was the one thing McLaughlin said her father cared about.

“When the winds started and the power went out, he called me over and told me to sit on the crate. The living room has no ceiling, the roof and its beams are exposed, and the crate was in that room. We sat the whole storm, opening the front door sometimes just to see the magnificent power of nature, and then returned to our normal posts, me on the crate, him nearby. We hatched a plan that if the roof went, I was to grab one side and he was to grab the other and we would run.”

The bowl, and rest of the house, survived the storm. The bowl later traveled to exhibits, packed in its special crate, but otherwise, Hamada kept it close.

When he died, his ashes were placed in the bowl during his memorial service on Kauai.

Last year, McLaughlin contacted Bishop Museum President and CEO Melanie Y. Ide about her father’s most-loved bowl. In December, on the anniversary of her father’s passing, McLaughlin posted a photo of the umeke on social media announcing that it had been placed in Bishop Museum and saying, “Mission accomplished.”

Hamada’s friend and apprentice Allen Kapali helped to prepare the bowl to be sent from Kauai to the museum on Oahu. Kapali found and fortified its original Iniki packing crate, and polished the bowl the painstaking way Hamada had taught him.

“Dad always polished the bowls watching television; ‘Gunsmoke,’ ‘The Beverly Hillbillies’ and the UH Wahine volleyball games were his favorite,” McLaughlin said. “There’s no lacquer on it, just the natural oils that come from the wood itself and the sheen lasts for decades.”

“Bishop Museum is honored to receive the donation of this very special umeke, which was created and treasured by Robert Hamada. This bowl is an extraordinary addition to the museum’s collection, and carries within it the ike (knowledge) and artistry of its maker for future generations to appreciate and learn from,” said Ide in a statement. “We’re incredibly grateful to Mr. Hamada’s family for their generosity.”

“While my dad is not Native Hawaiian, his artwork and life’s work was rooted in Native Hawaiian traditions,” McLaughlin said. “He respected the wood that he locally sourced, never cutting down trees for his own use, only gaining wood when someone who owned the property wanted to get rid of the tree. And he revered the craftsmanship of Native Hawaiians, particularly how they created such artworks without modern tools and conveniences.

“For me, having his work included in the collection of the Bishop Museum, which celebrates Native Hawaiian culture, just feels right.”

Reach Lee Cataluna at 529-4315 or lcataluna@staradvertiser.com.