Normally around this time every month Chris writes a blog post to tell you that the Lost Art Press storefront in Covington, Ky., will be open on the coming Saturday. But with Chris visiting his (kind of) ancestral homeland, it’s up to me to announce and host the storefront’s open house.
And so, we’re going to do things a bit differently this weekend. Of course, the storefront (at 837 Willard St. in Covington, Ky.) will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday (June 9). But this week, I’ll be setting the shop up for a particular set of activities: whittlin’, chire mekin’ an crown craftin’.
Yes – this weekend, in keeping with the recent research Chris and I have been doing on Chester Cornett, I’ll be setting up the shop for a number of Appalachian craft activities.
- I’ll have three shavehorses out front for making posts and rungs for chairs. I’ll be attempting to encourage (coerce?) people to join me in making simple shaved parts – the rocker I’m hoping to recreate has quite a few.
- I’ll have tools and green wood for some good old fashioned whittling and (Kentucky-style) slöjd – at last month’s Appalachian festival here in Cincinnati I picked up an old book full of different woodcraft projects from the mountains from which I’m pulling a few fun-looking projects.
- We’ll be playing the movie “Hand Carved” all day in the front room, which is an incredible documentary film made by Appalshop on Chester Cornett, following him through the process of making one chair.
- We’ll also be making some paper crowns in the style of the Craftsman King of the Cumberlands.
Also, “Cut & Dried” has arrived at the storefront and will be available for purchase and perusal. I’ve been reading through it over the past few days, and I’m loving it.
If you’re looking for more to do in the area this weekend:
- We’ve said it a few times, but the Kentucky Folk Art Center is less than two hours away from the shop in Morehead, Ky., and with its funding in jeopardy, it may be closing its doors in the next few months. It is well worth the trip, and there are three chairs by Cornett on display currently.
- Chako Bakery Cafe is only two blocks from the shop, and by around 9:30 a.m. on the weekend there is an incredible array of Japanese baked goods, savory and sweet, that bring in Japanese expats from hours away.
- The Terracotta Army exhibit at the Cincinnati Museum of Art opened a few weeks ago, and is a breathtaking survey of the life and legacy of China’s first emperor.
- The Swing House at the Contemporary Arts Center in Cincinnati looks amazing – suspend yourself from a three-story tall swing in a beautiful space. Both the CAC and CMA museums have free admission, with special exhibits costing only a small special fee.
See you this weekend!
The stairs in the photo look like the new ones in the Mortise & Tenon shop.
That is a very clever jig for bending chair (or should it be ‘chire’?) backs that Cornett is working on there, if I’m not wrong… anybody able to decipher the last line of his sign though?
Think it says; “We make anything or it can’t be made”