The next job is to smooth the carved portion of the seat until there are no distinct bumps or transitions, leaving a surface ready for scraping. For this, I reach for a travisher.
Some users prefer a compass plane, and when I started I made and used one. In my experience, the travisher is a more versatile tool, so my compass plane sits rarely used. The compass plane does excel, however, at getting even curves at the back of long settees.
The travisher can be tough to get used to because folks often roll the tool back while pushing it to find the cutting edge; this makes the tool take a heavy cut and jams the throat with shavings. Using a travisher or spokeshave requires a movement that is counter-intuitive and must be practiced.
Fig. 19.24 Hand position and pressure is essential to travisher technique.
Unlike when using a carving tool, where lowering the handle actually raises the edge out of a cut (like a spoon in ice cream), these tools take a deeper cut when the handles are dropped back. To come out of the cut with control and not have the thick end of the shaving clog the throat, the tool must be rolled forward at the end of each stroke. This is a strange action and no one should expect it to feel normal at first. Practice this “stroke” without engaging the blade, just riding on the surface and exaggerating the rolling forward at the end of the stroke, jutting your wrists forward. I know it feels wrong, but it’s right. To see the illustration of this motion, refer to the section on pitch-adjusted tools in Hand Tools: Sharpening & Use.
Fig. 19.25 Cutting the back of the seat to match the travisher.
Like the inshave, I use the travisher across the fibers while skewing it in the direction that the end grain descends. This allows me to traverse the transition areas without getting hung up in the end grain of the opposing side. A subtle crisscross pattern will help create an even surface.
The shape of the travisher is also helpful in creating a consistent curve at the back of the seat. Cut in front of the gutter until the shape of the seat matches the shape of the travisher. If you want to make it deeper, skew the travisher. If the tool won’t cut in the center of the curve any longer, check to make sure that there isn’t material holding it up in the surrounding areas.
The travisher is one of my favorite tools. I use the various portions of the blade to refine the curves of the seat with a speed that allows me to “see” the seat take shape and make subtle adjustments as needed. Rubbing your hand with its palm flat across the seat’s surface can help to detect any bumps or dips. At this point, the initial depth holes should be barely visible, if at all.
Fig. 19.26 Smoothing the surface with the travisher across the grain.Fig. 19.27 Examine the surface for areas that need refining.
Old things return with a difference. Nowadays we do not burn Yule logs nor go a-mumming. Our feasting has less of the grand heartiness of the Middle Ages. Nevertheless, Christmas, almost alone of all the great feasts, has retained its essential spirit of universal good will. Christmas opens the heart, sweeps away some of the cobwebs from our darker corners. The feast of the family, it reminds us of the greater family to which we all belong, and a tide of good fellowship flows out at Christmas to the poor and the lonely as at no other time of the year. We should all be poorer without it, for there is a fellowship in rejoicing which remains over when the last crumb of the feast has been swept away, when the last sprig of holly has been burned.
Among craftsmen, especially, a spirit of good fellowship makes all the difference. Modern conditions do not always make it easy. Wherever there is a feeling of insecurity a man may easily become distrustful of his fellows, guarding his knowledge with the feeling that it is the one thing he has to arm him against the world. But hoarded knowledge can never be as productive as knowledge which is shared. It is not the man who warns off enquirers with a mutter of “trade secrets” and a “please-keep-off-the-grass” expression who will keep abreast of the times, but the man who will readily exchange experiences, discuss, and, when need be, give guidance to others. It is remarkable, when one comes to think of it, the number of ideas which are generated in conversation. A tradesman can easily, in answering the questions of the novice, be brought to consider for the first time the whys and wherefores of using certain processes. Such was the trade custom, but why? Or, swopping experiences with another old hand, he gets to know of other methods as sound, maybe sounder, than his own. But he has to give as well as take. There has to be fellowship, even in the generation of ideas.
The real expert need never fear the competition of the amateur. He may impart his knowledge but his skill remains his own. There is a story told by Vasari of how Michael Angelo, the great painter and sculptor of the Italian Renaissance once came to the help of a very mediocre painter, commissioned to paint a picture which proved too difficult for him. Labouring on as best he could, the painter reached at last a point where he had to pack a row of soldiers, in various foreshortened attitudes, into a very narrow space, and there he absolutely stuck. He begged Michael Angelo to tell him how to do it. We are told that Michael Angelo, laughing good-humouredly, picked up a piece of charcoal and sketched in the figures he required, “all done with the judgment and excellence peculiar to him.” And, Vasari shrewdly adds, the painter afterwards completed the work “in such a manner that no one would have supposed Michael Angelo had ever looked at it!”
The Italian Renaissance was the golden age of craftsmanship. There was an amazing flowering of genius in painting, sculpture, goldsmith’s and silversmith’s work, in fact in every kind of craft, research and experiment were carried to the limit. Ideas were in the air, bandied about in workshop and studio, till the fertile soil of genius brought them to perfection. And it is significant that it was an age of great good fellowship among craftsmen. Competition was terrific; there were so many of them at the game and the prizes were glittering, but again and again it is evident from the pages of Vasari how freely they pooled their experiences, and how freely criticism, advice and generous appreciation circulated. They were a mixed bunch too. Dullards and plodders worked side by side with talented men, and there were inspired cut-throats among the men of genius. But this much they all had in common: a love of the work they found to their hand and a readiness to pass on the knowledge they had acquired.
On the whole it would seem that gardeners are the least reticent of us all and the readiest of all to share. Whether it is the amateur, passing on roots and cuttings and seedlings to his neighbour next door, or the professional, overflowing with knowledge which he is perfectly willing to impart, undoubtedly the spirit of good fellowship shows among gardeners at its best. It is the kind of spirit we should like to see increase among woodworkers. For we are convinced that it is the best stimulus of all to good craftsmanship.
And woodwork has such fine old traditions. It is a family affair if ever there was one, bound up with the home. In olden times the Yule log, nowadays the fir tree, forms the central feature of Christmas merrymaking:
“Sword of wood and doll of wax, Little children, sing Nowell. Swing on the stem was cleft with the axe! Craftsmen all, a ‘Gloria’.”
We had to relist our one copy of Deluxe Roubo on Furniture from the Blem Sale (along with a copy of “By Hound & Eye,” plus we still have some “Book of Plates.”) So IF YOU ARE LOCAL or are willing to travel tomorrow:
The books are listed here in Chris’ eBay store. They are all 50 percent off retail. They are listed for pickup only with no shipping options. If you buy one, you (or your spouse, child or buddy) must pick it up on Dec. 23. We can’t ship it to you – we don’t have the boxes or packing material here in Covington. If you beg me (Megan Fitzpatrick) to mail you one, I will say no. So please, please, please don’t make this uncomfortable or weird for us. And especially don’t email help@lostartpress.com. They are dealing with holiday craziness and don’t have anything to do with this blem sale.
The two project chairs featured in the book: the balloon-back (left) and the fan-back.
I love going to the Lie-Nielsen Toolworks Open House (almost) every summer for a number of reasons, but one of the best is getting to hang out with chairmaker extraordinaire Pete Galbert for a few days. He’s been there at every event I’ve had the pleasure of attending.
Pete is one of those people who always puts a smile on my face, because there’s always one on his. He’s just so darn nice and fun to be around. And he’s an extraordinary teacher – I was blown away by his presentations at Woodworking in America (back in my former life).
Hopefully I’ll get to see him in person next summer (if not sooner). But for now, I’ll have to make do with seeing him on his spindle turning and milk paint videos. And, of course, reading from his book (for which he also did all the gorgeous drawings).
Obviously there is a long history to the Windsor chair. And along the way, I’m sure that just about every imaginable technology has been used to build them and all sorts of design innovations have been tried. I am neither a historian nor a wood technologist; luckily, there are a number of good books on both subjects. In setting out to write this book, I wanted to make chairmaking accessible and open a door into a gratifying kind of woodworking.
Looking back, I recognize that my own transition into working with green wood took place in stages. I remember simply wanting to see what a drawknife could do, and I didn’t care if it was on a split piece of oak destined for a chair or a 2×4. I encourage you to act on your impulse to explore and play. These are vital steps in the learning process.
Even though I could simply lay out a single path to success for making a chair, I recognize that each of us comes from a different background, workshop and skill set, so I’ve tried to stress the principles that you’ll encounter, knowing that you will apply the information that best suits your ability and interests.
I’ve structured the information so that the basic concepts are illustrated, and if you want to go deeper into the topic, you can delve further into the text. Illustrating the book myself was an obvious choice for me because not only do I enjoy drawing, but I also hope to impart as much visual information as possible. Plus, the chairs, with their thin lines and crisp silhouettes, translate beautifully when drawn.
The project portion of this book details the process of building the two chairs shown below. While the process for building a chair is simple, there are many opportunities to learn more about the materials, tools and techniques.
The project chairs were chosen both for their similarities and differences. Besides some aesthetic elements, the chairs are structurally identical from the seat down. That way, making one chair will give you experience that will serve you in the other. From the seat up, the difference is both aesthetic and technological. If you have access to green wood, you will find the balloon-back attainable. If you are limited to sawn (hopefully air-dried) lumber, you can make your way through the fan-back, which lacks the extreme bend, yet it has slightly more complex joinery in the crest.
Another reason that I chose these chairs is that they point the way toward two different families of design within the Windsor tradition. The balloon-back is a great introduction to the classic forms, such as the continuous-arm, sack-back and comb-back.
If your interest runs more toward more modern options, the fan-back leads to other designs with clean Asian-influenced lines, such as the birdcage and the step-down-crest styles. My unpainted contemporary designs are mostly rooted in the technology that begins with the fan-back form.
Drawing of two “families” of chairs to which each project chair belongs.
I also cover options for building these chairs using the lathe in a limited way, or without using a lathe at all. While turning is the most efficient way to make the legs and joinery, not having experience with or access to a lathe should not stop you from making a fine chair.
In this book, I’ve tried to address the questions that riddled me as I ventured into chairmaking and share some of the lessons and discoveries I’ve found helpful along the way. I spent most of my earlier years as a woodworker poring over books to squeeze out the information that I needed. One thing that struck me was that I got something new each time I returned to my favorite texts. My goal here is to not only demonstrate ways to achieve the tasks, but to show some of the common problems you might encounter and how to address them. Because of this, some of the descriptions might make more sense to you once you’ve worked with the process and found a problem for yourself. If the depth of the information here ever seems daunting, take a deep breath and rest assured you can make a chair that will exceed your expectations with only the basic concepts in hand. Once you’ve grown comfortable with them, the rest of the information might be more inviting.
Even for experienced furniture makers, each process will likely introduce new challenges. From splitting wood to turning, steam bending to carving, it’s a different way of looking at making a piece of furniture. While there are many steps involved in making a successful chair, and mastering the process can be a lifetime pursuit, a little effort and resilience will pay off at each turn.
My hope is that the information here encourages you to build your first chair, or perhaps just your latest.
Peter Galbert’s hoop-back on the left, and perch on the right. He uses these two seating forms to teach you the foundations of chairmaking in his new video series.
Part one (available now) focuses on kiln-dried wood and Pete’s “perch” – a stool with a decidedly modern look. In this episode, he discusses chair design and ergonomics, and introduces all the tools and techniques to get you started in chairmaking. And he shows you how to make the perch, of course.
Part two (available soon) will focus on green wood and making a traditional Winsdor hoop-back stool (what some might call a sack back), and introduce some more advanced techniques.
Pete says that his overall goal “is to remove whatever is limiting you from making your chairs. Because really, this technology is as simple as drilling a hole, and whittling a peg to fit in it, and knocking it home.”
The tools Pete introduces/shows you how to use.
Altogether, Pete says there will be 8-10 hours of video instruction in this “foundation” series (all included in the $69.99 price). By the time the series is complete, you’ll have a solid foundation in chairmaking tools and techniques, as well as design and comfort considerations, to make many kinds of seating – and you’ll discover that chairmaking isn’t scary at all!
This link will take you to all of Pete’s Vimeo videos (including his recent series on using milk paint), as well as Vimeo videos featuring Pete’s work (I’d forgotten about that video Chris Schwarz did of “Chairmaker’s Notebook!). To sign up for his new series, click on the trailer for “Foundations.”
