Do You Sign Your Work?

September 14, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

Do you sign your work? If you don’t, you should consider it, and I’m not just speaking to those selling their work. Signing your working serves many valuable purposes, arguably more so for the amateur or hobbyist furnituremaker. Signing your work establishes a record. Affix a paper label, brand, or a decal with your name, [...]

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Passion, Skill, & Craft

August 19, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

“Without passion, all the skill in the world won’t lift you above craft. Without skill, all the passion in the world will leave you eager but floundering. Combining the two is the essence of the creative life” Twyla Tharp The Creative Habit: Learn it and Use it for Life 2003, Simon & Schuster

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Ebony Table Buttons

July 25, 2012 by · 2 Comments

I designed the ebony table button to encourage people to touch my furniture and experience the phenomenon of wood movement. Wood is a living, breathing organism. As one season turns to another, wood absorbs or gives-off moisture as the relative humidity around it changes. A table top, even one made of quarter-sawn wood, will have some movement [...]

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Tall Tall Trees!

June 8, 2012 by · 2 Comments

Long ago, William Morris established drawing design inspiration from nature as one of the tenants of the Arts & Crafts movement. Knowing this, and being a fan of wood, I’ve always wanted to see California’s coastal redwoods. I recently checked this off my ToDo list. When I arrived, I was awe-struck by what a peaceful and tranquil place groves [...]

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Building Gustav Stickley’s No. 53 Double Costumer

May 10, 2012 by · 6 Comments

My second collaboration with Editor Tom Casper and the outstanding staff at American Woodworker has hit the newsstands! Check out the May/June 2012 issue. Beginning on page 36 are step-by-step instructions on how to build a Gustav Stickley No. 53 Double Costumer — which is sometimes called a coat rack. What’s great about this seemingly [...]

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Verbs

April 24, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

“…I think people need to be reminded that creativity is a verb, a very time-consuming verb. It’s about taking an idea in your head, and transforming that idea into something real. And that’s always going to be a long and difficult process. If you’re doing it right, it’s going to feel like work.” Milton Glaser [...]

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Air-drying Lumber

April 18, 2012 by · 4 Comments

For many years furnituremakers have preferred building with air-dried lumber over kiln dried lumber. Among its reported benefits are more brilliant color, improved workability (both with power and hand tools), and its superior suitability for steam bending — because the wood’s lignin remains permeable. I recently stacked  a shipment of roughly 500 board-feet of curly, [...]

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