This project is difficult to talk about – mostly because it is like trying to describe in a phone conversation all the objects you could find in a Sears store.
Since the day that John Hoffman and I started Lost Art Press, one of our goals was to republish (legally) the work of Charles Hayward, the editor of The Woodworker magazine for three decades and my personal woodworking hero.
Hayward was a traditionally trained British craftsman, a professional woodworker, a talented writer and a near-genius illustrator. And he worked like a dog.
After much tribulation, we secured the rights to publish Hayward’s work in The Woodworker between 1937 and 1967. That was the easy part. During the last five years, a large team of people have been dissecting this huge amount of data, scanning it, proofing it and organizing it so it is a comprehensive look at Hayward’s writings on hand tools.
The result will be a huge – easily more than 500 pages – large-scale book that will cover all aspects of the craft, including every word that Hayward wrote on joinery, plus tools, turning, carving, finishing and traditional design.
Today was a major milestone for the project. John, Tim Henrickson and I made a final sweep through the 360 magazine issues to make sure we didn’t miss anything on joinery. The good news is that we didn’t find much that we had missed. By the end of this month, all this stuff will go to the page designer, Linda Watts.
To give you the tiniest taste of what is to come, download this one-page information graphic that Hayward drew on remouthing a plane. It’s only one page and yet describes something that could take a writer many pages to do equally well.
We do not have a release date for this book yet, except: As soon as humanly possible.
— Christopher Schwarz
Best LAP project yet. What about his books? From previous posts I think you said his books were compilations from the magazine. I bought all of his books I could afford. All are excellent.
We hope that this compilation will exceed his books in many ways.
His books have an unclear ownership path in my opinion, which is why they are out of print. We chose to stick with the original source material and to do it the best we could.
That’s fine. The magazine articles would be harder to find anyway. This project will put most modern woodworking authors to shame – or challenge them to do better.
Truly inspiring. The line up of future releases is something to be excited about.
Bravo!!
Loving the resurgence of old info that the internet and LAP have fostered. I remember trying to get woodworking info at our small town library back in the 70s and all it had were a few power tool books put out by Time/LIFE (in between the macrame and decoupage titles).
This project will, possibly, atone for The History of Wood.
I’ve got a small collection of The Woodworker volumes from 1942-46 and they are an absolute joy to read. Beautiful illustrations, fantastic detail and a wealth of historical info presented in a clear and concise style.
I can’t wait to see it all in one book.
If anything can, this will…
Looks like it will be great.
Will be looking forward to this great work!
You posted some great image samples a few weeks ago, which you explained were from Hayward. I found his “Practical Woodwork” in the library and fell in love with it, instantly dug up a used copy on Amazon. A fantastic book. Looking forward to your compilation.
Wow, I’m looking forward to this one!
Thank you to everyone involved with this project! I can’t wait for the book.
Hope those great 40’s sans serif fonts like in the re-mouthing article get retained!
My LAP list keeps growing.