Once a center for socializing, the bowling alleys of the 1950s and '60s have gone the way of drive-in theaters and penny candy. But some lucky lanes have survived the scrap heap and are once again the heart of get-togethers. A Brooklyn-based company, CounterEvolution NYC, has been turning the wood of demolished bowling lanes into dining tables and more since 2007.

Owner Jim Malone said he wasn't looking to get rich by repurposing the old lanes.

"It just sort of landed in my lap," he says.

Malone, 44, was searching for a large slab of wood to build a kitchen counter for his New York City apartment when someone told him about a stash of disassembled bowling lanes.

"I loved the way it looked when it was cleaned up," he said, "and when friends would come over, they just loved it, too."

He explained to friends his counter's past life supporting gutter balls and a parade of two-toned shoes. The counter wasn't the only one with a former career.

A struggling professional musician, Malone was looking for more work when he discovered the charms of 1- by 2-inch slats of maple and heart pine.

"The old bowling alleys were usually the heart pine, which is more dense than the Southern yellow pine," he said. "It suggests designs based on the material."

He has mostly phased out the maple because it was harder to work with.

"I just found it much more interesting to do furniture, but we still do countertops if that's what a customer wants," he said.

Everything is handmade in his production studio and showroom in Brooklyn. He has anywhere from two to five people making the furniture to order, and the orders have been substantial. Commercial clients include Starbucks and Sweet Greens, a salad shop started by a few Georgetown University students that now has stores in other cities.

"The Sweet Greens guys really wanted reclaimed materials for their furnishings, and after Googling one night, they found me," he said.

"I'm pretty much self-taught. Trial-and-error has been my best teacher," he said with a laugh.

Some of the furniture is done with a finger splice of the legs through the top. Made entirely of wood, it's called the Rustic Line and requires precision cutting so it will fit tightly together.

"It's a lot of hard work using the techniques we've developed. It's all handcrafted, no matter how big the order is," he said.

CounterEvolution NYC's products come in seven stains or finishes, ranging from natural to ebony. Customers can expect to pay $2,500 to $3,500 for a dining table.

Because there is not an infinite supply of old bowling alleys, there will come a day when the game is over. But Malone has already started to experiment with other reclaimed materials. He isn't worried about running out of lanes.

"I'm going to be able to make a lot of furniture before that happens," he said. "I have a lot of designs I want to try."