I’m a furniture maker first and a writer second, or maybe third (after, perhaps, being a master of tangential side projects). So, when I approached writing “James Krenov: Leave Fingerprints,” my biography of the cabinetmaker who was the founder of the woodworking school I attended, it seemed appropriate to take part in retracing some of his steps as a craftsperson.
In Krenov’s body of work, there is one piece that always stood out to me for its graceful presence and idiosyncratic form: 1977’s “A Playful Thing,” detailed extensively in Krenov’s third book on cabinetmaking, “The Impractical Cabinetmaker.” The piece is a pivotal demarcation in Krenov’s output – both a reprisal of his 1962 “No-Glass Showcase of Lemon Wood” from the earliest stage of his career and a harbinger of his future output of leggy cabinets on stands. I also had the pleasure of seeing the piece in person; Krenov kept it and it is still in the family. Seeing it in person confirmed its appeal to me.
So, in February of 2019, I started my own version of the piece. I was happy to have both Krenov’s original drawings for the piece (published in “The Impractical Cabinetmaker”) as well as the insight I’d gained from examining much of his work. I had a pretty good footing to start on. But the understated form of this cabinet hides the complexity of its execution. Between the veneer work, the drawers that pass through both ends of the carcase, the carefully carved and chamfered legs and rails, and the drive to make every inch just right, even from unlikely views below or above, it is a real skill test. By the time I started this piece, I was five years out of the College of the Redwoods (now The Krenov School), and while I like to think my skills are always improving, the truth is that this kind of work requires constant practice and refinement of execution to be done properly and gracefully. I had some uphill battles.
Krenov’s original was made with East Indian rosewood and Andaman padauk, woods I wasn’t going to hold my breath looking for these days, but after trips up to Keim Lumber in Millersburg, Ohio, and C.R. Muterspaw in Xenia, Ohio, I came home with some stunning gonçalo alves for the stand/drawer fronts and densely figured soft maple for the veneered surfaces. I rounded those out with aromatic cedar for the drawer bottoms, hard maple for the drawer sides and African blackwood for the pulls, and I’m pleased with my choices.
The result, which I’m happy to still have in our bedroom a year and a half later (and 750 miles from Covington, Ky., where I built it), came out in the way as do many reprisals or reiterations of another maker’s design: different and telling of my process, but in the spirit of Krenov’s original, I think.
Are the proportions exact to Krenov’s original? No. Is the shaping identical? Definitely not. Am I James Krenov? Well, come on, of course not. But in making this piece, and walking a few months in Krenov’s shop slippers, I learned quite a bit. I noticed certain aspects of the piece’s construction that betray Krenov’s history: the dexterous use of a knife in carving the legs and the pulls recall his early life spent carving with a jackknife in Alaska; the aesthetic touch of stepped chamfers and an almost architectural composition echo his teacher, Carl Malmsten, whose roots were firmly planted in the English Arts & Crafts movement.
There is a second stream of influence the piece has exerted over the year and half since I finished building it. With an open and inviting showcase area, what Krenov referred to as a “stage,” it is too hard to resist constantly rotating and replacing small objects to showcase. I find myself picking up the objects in residence and looking them over, something I wouldn’t necessarily do if they were tucked away on a shelf or in a glass cabinet.
And this action, the constant consideration and handling of small, fine objects, might be the most impactful effect this piece had on my consideration of Krenov’s work. Krenov often insisted that his showcase cabinets “complemented” the pieces they displayed, and while the cabinet itself might be artfully done or worthy of examination, it wasn’t doing its job well if it couldn’t elevate or showcase its contents. While I’d read Krenov’s words regarding this, actually living with something that encouraged this interaction made it clear. Throughout his lectures, personal papers and his books, Krenov mentions craftspeople from other mediums, like the potters Bernard Leach or Eva Zeisel, in that light, showcase cabinets like “A Playful Thing” make perfect sense of his role as a cabinetmaker. It may be a “chicken-and-egg” problem – whether his appreciation for small crafts came before his penchant for making showcase cabinets or vice versa, but either way, living with this piece has made it clear how Krenov saw that role.
You can’t write a book by building cabinets. Nor can you build a cabinet just by digging through lumberyards and antique stores. But if you can balance these experiences in just the right way, they might just culminate in work that is more than the sum of its parts. I can’t say I’m sure I got there with my cabinet, but the cabinet helped me consider Krenov’s life and work.
Reminds me of the (para)phrase “Don’t follow in their footsteps but rather seek what they sought”. Keep on your journey Brendan.
Thanks Eric! That is one of the joys of doing this work – lots of moments and experiences on which to reflect and consider.
Brendan,
Having been, if I may call it that, a “Krenov ignoramus” for most of my life, I cant say that I’ve ever had any sort of relation to neither his work nor his writings; however, your postings here have piqued my curiosity and whetted my appetite, and made me look forward very much to your book!
By the way, I have also been much impressed by the way your obviously quite painstaking approach to the subject has come across in said blog postings, an example of which has been your diligent and correct handling of names, words and expressions in Swedish, which as it happens is my native tongue but, if I’ve understood you correctly, is pretty much Greek to you?!
So thanks, already, for opening my eyes already to Mr Krenov and his work – I think I shall endeavour to maintain my general ignorance until after your book is published, so that I may read it and enter its universe with my sense of wonder fully open for business!
Many thanks in advance,
Mattias
Hey Mattias,
Well, yes, Swedish is nearly Greek to me, though several months of the process of researching Krenov’s writing involved a pretty deep dive into Swedish media. I relied heavily on Google Translate (it has gotten incredibly good!) and I also enlisted the help of several native speakers, including both of Krenov’s daughters. The Swedish wasn’t nearly as hard as the pre-Revolution Russian documents, but again, I was lucky to have a dear friend in St. Petersburg, Max Shelton, who is himself a Russian language scholar and was kind enough to lend me his brain for the work.
There are some great documents that you, as a Swedish speaker, might enjoy – in particular, Krenov’s article for “FORM,” the Svenska Slöjdföreningen’s design periodical, might really interest you. If you’re interested, I can send along that section of the bibliography. There is no online archive that I could find, but a good library near you should have them (the Cincinnati Public Library had a full physical archive). Also, Dagnes Nyheter published several of his short stories, and those are available online through their website. Those are all early fiction/travelogue of Krenov’s, that I only had the benefit of reading through online translation and through his daughter’s summaries, but you might enjoy them with your access to the language!
Glad your excited!
B
Hello again Brendan,
All the more impressive, then, for you to have managed to keep such good track of all those pesky å’s, ä’s, and ö’s!
About FORM, I live in Belgium these days, where I’m less than sure that your average public library would have it, although it does seem from their online catalogue that e.g. the University Library in Leuven (which is some 10 miles from where I live) has at least some issues. However, with current restrictions in place, I think it might be less than obvious to gain access, even though it seems they permit outside readers. In other words, I might just as well wait for your book to come out with the bibliography all in it, and then look it up here, or in Sweden, once things are sufficiently back to normal that a library visit sounds more like a fun day out and less than an exhibit of personal bravery …
I’ll be sure to remember, though, to look it up once that becomes feasible again, so many thanks for the tip!
In the meantime, I look forward with anticipation to your Bench Talk 101 appearance tomorrow!
Cheers,
Mattias
Just a heads up for future articles that include the “carousel of images”. In emails, the pictures overlay the subsequent paragraphs and the text is unreadable. Apologies if you all were being sneaky and trying to drive traffic to the site lol! Really enjoyed the article and just trying to help. Have a great day!
For some reason, your article on “a playful thing” has the text superimposed over some of the pictures making it impossible to read. Being a Krenovian I would really like to read your article. I enjoyed the first article you wrote about the life of Krenov and forwarded it to a friend, who is a two year graduate of the program, who really enjoyed it and then forwarded it to other graduates. Is it possible to republish it or sent me a clean copy?
Sorry about that. If you click on the email and read it on the website, the post is correctly formatted. It looks like the email service doesn’t like it when we publish a carousel of images.
I think it interesting that certain pieces require a certain room decor or even house. Playful things’ use of negative space demands a wall to itself—a luxury which my house, with its many windows and very little wall space, lacks.
That’s certainly true. One of the more telling things I learned from a few Scandinavian interviewees was the way in which items are stored or displayed in their homes. According to a few people I spoke with, mid-Century Scandinavian households usually had a few choices spots in their otherwise uncluttered homes for the display of a few nice objects or heirlooms, a context in which Krenov’s showcase cabinets make a lot of sense. My home is far from uncluttered, but I have found that having a dedicated space to highlight a few precious items really changes my interactions with those objects.
Any chance of re-sending Brendan Gaffney’s latest piece? Last section is printed on the final two images and I could not read.
Wish I could. But WP doesn’t let us do that unless we repost it. If you click here:
https://blog.lostartpress.com/2020/10/07/playful-things/
You’ll read it properly formatted.
Sorry about the problem!
Thanks – will do.
No schwong on the dovetails! They are lovely, all the same. Well done, and I’m really looking forward to the biography once it is published. Your Krenov postings this last year have been very enjoyable reading.
Like so many other details, I consider the little curves in dovetails as another design choice – and boy, they can be a bear! I didn’t use them here, because the rectilinear form of the cabinet doesn’t call for them (in my opinion!). But i do regularly go for them on small work, cabinet drawers or boxes, because they do add a bit of interest! I do, however, always use variably spaced dovetails – a touch Krenov referred to as “rhythm” in the layout. That’s just something that, to me, every dovetailed piece can wield effectively.
Thanks for following the postings, and I’m thrilled you’ll have the biography in your hands soon!
Brendan in which one of his books is this piece in? You did a wonderful job reproducing it with your own flavor added to it.
The Impractical Cabinetmaker, pages 100-113.
Thank you!
“,,,a master of tangential side projects.” That is a very nice turn of phrase. Suffering from a life-long affliction with limited-attention-span, being regularly distracted in side projects has been the bane of my existence. Unlike you though, I am not a master of them, but as in almost everything else, a total amateur. The only thing I can say in favor is that I am seldom bored.
Amen. If it makes you feel any better, I have started many more projects than I’ve finished! But I, too, am rarely bored!
I hope you stopped at Colonial Homestead on your trips to Keim.
Thanks for the great article. As a cabinet maker, wood butcher and sometimes furniture designer, I’ve always been influenced by his work. He knew how to say more with less. I remember going to one of his weekend lectures so many years ago. Looking back, it would have been nice to go to his school. I would say you’ve done very well with that training from him.