About Wesley
📍 Lexington, Virginia
Wesley Tate has been packing into the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests most weekends for twenty-two years. He runs a one-man finish-carpentry shop in Lexington, Virginia, which is what pays for the gear and gives him the schedule freedom to disappear into the ridges. He writes about bushcraft from the perspective of a working tradesman who learned by doing — not by teaching, not by selling courses.
Wesley Tate is a 44-year-old finish carpenter and sole proprietor of a one-man trim and finish business in Lexington, Virginia. He has been practicing bushcraft in the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests for twenty-two years — since 2003, when a Mora Companion and a dog-eared copy of Mors Kochanski got him started. His kit is built around gear he has actually worn out and replaced: the Mora Companion (carbon, Scandi grind), the Council Tool Hudson Bay axe, the Bahco Laplander saw, the Filson Mackinaw cruiser jacket. He lives in Lexington with his wife Holly and two teenagers, Caleb and Anna. On weekends he is usually somewhere in the Blue Ridge or Allegheny ranges, carrying more than he should and enjoying all of it.