I have been invited back to Germany this summer to teach a four-day introduction to chairmaking course at Dictum’s classroom in Niederalteich, a gorgeous monastery in Bavaria.
The class is in English (my German is terrible), and the location is a fantastic place to stay and learn. You can rent a room at the monastery. And we all eat meals together in the monastery’s gasthaus.
The class runs from July 9-12. Beginning chairmakers are most welcome. In the class we will each build a simple backstool and focus on the fundamentals – the angles, the joinery and training your hands to be a chairmaker.
While the chair shown is unsaddled, we will also cover basic saddling.
You can read more about the area and the class here.
I hope to teach a Dutch tool chest class the following week in Munich. More details on that class soon.
A ladderback by Terry Ratliff, one of the speakers at the upcoming event.
Andy Glenn’s new book “Backwoods Chairmakers” has been a runaway hit – we’ve about blown through the first press run after only 3-1/2 months.
Recently, Andy had the great idea to gather the chairmakers from his book at Berea College so readers can meet these chairmakers, hear their stories, see their chairs and watch demonstrations of how they work.
We think it’s a great idea, so we are working with Berea College Student Craft to hold the event on Sunday, June 2, at the college’s campus in Berea, Kentucky. Tickets will be $33, and attendance is capped at 200 people.
The all-day event will feature 13 Appalachian chairmakers from Andy’s book. We’ve asked each demonstrator to bring some of their chairs so you can see the work in person. All the chairs will be assembled in a gallery for you to enjoy. We’ll also have four other “stages” going all day for you to visit.
The Storytime Stage: Where chairmakers will share their tales of how they got into the craft and manage to keep their business afloat in a world filled with mass-manufactured goods.
The Turning Stage: Several of the turners use lathes in their work and will demonstrate how they make parts using this machine.
The Shaping & Assembly Stage: Chairmakers will demonstrate the techniques they use to shape posts & rungs and assemble the chairs.
The Greenwood Stage: Splitting, hewing and hickory bark demonstrations will take place in this outdoor area.
Plus Andy will be there to sign books.
Ladderback chairs are finally getting their moment in the sun, and I hope you’ll make the drive to Berea this June to attend this remarkable event. There is lots to do and see in Central Kentucky, so it would be easy to make this part of a quick weekend vacation.
More details on the event and registration will come later this week.
Please note that this is not a money-making venture. Berea College Student Craft has donated the space for the event. The tickets cover the honorariums for the chairmakers.
— Christopher Schwarz
Places nearby Berea (or on the way) that woodworkers and their families would love:
House & Garden magazine in the U.K. has a nice feature on vernacular stick chairs and cricket tables in its current issue. You can read the article here.
Tim Bowen of Tim Bowen Antiques is quoted throughout. Tim and Betsan Bowen authored “The Welsh Stick Chair,” a lovely book that we stock. (It is the only non-Lost Art Press title in our store.) We are awaiting stock on this book from its third printing.
If you are interested in learning more about vernacular pieces, we have you covered. Check out:
“The Anarchist’s Tool Chest,” the book that allowed me to quit my corporate job, is now available as a free pdf download, now and forever. To download it, you need only click on this link. You don’t have to register, give up your email or do any other smarmy marketing idiocy.
We will continue to sell the printed version for people who like nice books that are designed and assembled to last lifetimes. And we are planning a revised edition of the title for the 15th anniversary of its publication. But the information itself? Free to everyone.
This is the sixth book of mine that I have made free. The others are here:
Somehow the stunning mosaics unearthed at the Huqoq synagogue during the last 12 years have escaped my attention. Reader Richard Mahler pointed them out to me, and I have been thinking about them all week.
The mosaic I have been poring over is the one depicting the construction of the Tower of Babel. There are stoneworkers (yawn). A crane taking materials to the top (kinda yawn). A guy adzing a post (!). A guy planing on a bench (!!). Sawing boards Egyptian style (!!!). And a fight with mallets vs. a bowsaw (!!!!). And an interesting window.
There is some interesting woodworking stuff in these mosaics. Let’s start with the guys ripping a board that is standing upright.
The synagogue was built in the early 5th century (C.E.), and yet here we have two guys ripping a plank in a clearly ancient Egyptian style. The plank is vertical and secured in place at the ground, and the workers are sawing down with a wedge in place to help keep the kerf open.
Ancient Egyptian sawyers were depicted working exactly this way with one exception. The ancient Egyptians used a bronze saw – it looks like a Japanese saw. With the teeth set to only one side of the blade.
The Romans here use a frame saw. As far as we know the Romans and Greeks invented frame saws and handplanes. So this is a real interesting transitional scene.
Next we have a guy working the side of a plank with an adze. The post is vertical. Again this is something you see in ancient Egyptian imagery. Later, adzes were shown with longer handles with the work on the floor. Though the handheld adze used vertically still survives in some cultures to this day.
And the workbench. My immediate reaction was: Look at that low Roman workbench. But 2 seconds later my head said: But why is the worker standing up as he planes a board on it? Do we have a problem here because this is a pre-perspective image? (Yes.) But does that explain why he is standing up? (No.)
So we just have to accept that maybe we don’t know what the artist saw. The worker holds the board with his left hand as he planes with his right. There is no evidence of a planing stop.
And finally we have a nice window and a fight between two workers: one holding a bowsaw and the other holding a mallet. The story of the Tower of Babel is about humanity’s attempt to build a tower to heaven. God cursed the workers and made them speak different languages. Chaos ensued.
One amazing thing: Early black woodworker. The earliest image I know.
Second thing: My money is on the guy with a mallet.
