When Horst John arrived in Brazil in the mid-twentieth century, he fell in love with the noble woods of the Brazilian Atlantic Forest, which stretches from the state of Rio de Janeiro thousands of kilometers northward to the states of Pernambuco and Rio Grande do Norte. John bought a 42-hectare forest in Aracruz in southeastern Brazil - just 40 kilometers away from a quaint backwoods community of some three thousand inhabitants - Guarana - in the state of Espirito Santo. That’s where John set up both a factory for bowmaking and a pernambuco wood nursery for replanting in the forest. The founder was attracted to the variety of noble woods in the Atlantic Forest as a source of inspiration, in much the same way that musician Tom Jobim was entranced by the songs of the hundreds of varieties of birds residing there. Both men became artists in their own right. Especially interested in what the Brazilians call Pau-Brasil, the tree after which the country was named, Horst John became fascinated by the technical specifications of the different varieties of pernambuco wood in bowmaking.