Robert Wearing’s “The Solution at Hand: Jigs & Fixtures to Make Benchwork Easier” has been printed and is en route to our warehouse in Indiana. As soon as it arrives, we will discontinue the special pre-publication offer where you receive a free PDF of the book when you purchase the hardback.
After Monday, purchasing the hardback and PDF together will be $30. If you order before midnight Eastern time on Monday, you will get both for $24.
“The Solution at Hand” is a great companion book to Wearing’s “The Essential Woodworker.” While “The Essential Woodworker” gives you essential basic information on using hand tools, “The Solution at Hand” is filled with hundreds of jigs, fixtures and appliances that make handwork a little easier, especially for repetitive operations.
You can read all the details and download a free excerpt here.
When I finish teaching a class at a woodworking school, there is always a debriefing. The owner asks me how the class went. Were there rough spots? Things that could be improved the next time? It’s standard “let’s be responsible adults” chatting.
That is never the case with Marc Adams, who runs the Marc Adams School of Woodworking in central Indiana. I started teaching there 15 years ago, and every debriefing conversation has been shockingly intimate, personal and cathartic.
Marc and I are about as different as two people can be in the way we see the world and approach woodworking. Yet we get along really well. We are both hard-driving, Type-A family men who juggle our love for our work with our love for our wives, kids, compatriots and craft.
So on Friday, Marc called me into his office after I finished teaching 17 (!) students to make an American Welsh Stick Chair and we went through the regular motions. Marc dropped my paycheck on the floor to ensure it didn’t bounce. He asked how my assistants (Doug, Eric and Will) did. Then he started into deeper stuff.
“So you’re a writer, furnituremaker, publisher, teacher,” Marc said. “So what…”
I braced myself to offer the answer I always give to the question, “So what are you, really? A writer? Furnituremaker? Publisher?”
I even opened my mouth to start forming the words. But the question I was expecting didn’t come.
“So what,” Marc asked, “makes you happy?”
It was like someone had punched me in the gut. I don’t think anyone has ever asked me that question. I sucked in a big breath and thought about it for a half-second.
“I like to build furniture based on my research and write about it,” I replied.
“Is that what you do?” Marc asked.
“Sometimes,” I said. I then started explaining where my income came from, but that wasn’t the answer that Marc was seeking. So I ended my vomiting of my 1040 with, “Sometimes, I get to do that.”
Marc nodded. And then he moved onto other stuff.
On the drive home, I put on the saddest album I own, Magnolia Electric Co.’s “What Comes After the Blues.” Sad music and the open road always opens my mind.
For the most part, I try to live by the mantra: Show, don’t tell.
But when people ask me questions about the business side of Lost Art Press, I sometimes have to straight up tell people how we work. The following paragraphs might sound like a screed or manifesto. They are not intended as such. They are just an effort to answer people’s frequently asked questions about our business.
Here we go.
John and I started this company by loaning it $2,000 each from our savings accounts to pay for our first press run of “The Art of Joinery” – plus to pay a young kid to design our online shopping cart so we could accept credit cards.
The company paid us back in about three weeks. Since then we’ve never taken a business loan (we have a couple tiny auto loans).
We don’t have investors or benefactors, silent or otherwise.
Our business has never been funded in any way by our spouses. We have never received money – gifts or loans – from family members to fund the company.
We have never sought or received grant money (public or private) to fund any of our research, books or operations. We have never sought or received tax credits or government benefits for Lost Art Press in any form. We simply pay our taxes, and we don’t argue with the accountant.
We have never accepted money or goods from a manufacturer. We pay for our own tools, whether they are digital or steel.
What about the storefront?
I bought the place in 2015 with my own money. It is owned entirely by me, not Lost Art Press. Lost Art Press didn’t pay for my home.
Also good to know: I do not charge Lost Art Press rent. Why would I? John and I are Lost Art Press (yes, I know there are tax issues and the like, but I don’t care).
What about authors?
We treat our authors better than any publishing house I’m aware of. We split all profits 50/50, and our authors receive sizable royalties every quarter (thanks to you, the customer).
I know this is a dumb way to run a modern business. John and I don’t care. We have attempted to structure Lost Art Press so it is nearly impossible to put us out of business while we are alive. And we hope to keep it that way.
Sorry for the overly declarative sentences and lack of animal idioms. All criticisms of our business can be lodged here.
The Lost Art Press storefront in Covington, Ky., will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. this Saturday, and we hope you can stop by to say hello.
The special (and free) lecture for that day will be about the non-toxic finishes that we use all the time in the shop. I’ll be mixing up some soap finish, plus I’ll show you the beeswax/linseed oil finish we use on chairs, how to use a polissoir for a burnished finish and demonstrate shou sugi ban – a charred finish (weather permitting).
And we’re all happy to answer your questions about finishing. The lecture starts at 2 p.m. and is free.
As always, we’ll be working at our benches and are happy to discuss or demonstrate any techniques that you have been struggling with. Want to learn to use a beading plane? Just ask. Sharpen a travisher or auger bit? We know how.
On the commerce side of things, we now have stock of the special historical reprint of “The Joiner & Cabinet Maker.” It’s as cute as a bug’s ear and is just $12 American. We also have Crucible lump hammers and scrapers in stock. Plus all our regular titles.
If you are looking for a good place to eat during your visit, we can’t get enough of Libby’s Southern Comfort. The fried chicken is aces. The bourbon slushes are dangerous. And the staff is wonderful. Also, the Covington Farmer’s Market is a great place to pick up baked goods. It closes at noon, so be sure to stop by the North South Baking tent and get an almond croissant.
I think that some of the modern rules for making a comfortable chair are inflexible, misinterpret the human body and ignore the needs of people on the shorter half of the bell curve.
Most of my ideas on chair comfort come from making chairs since the 1990s, everything from frame chair, Morris chairs, Windsor chairs and vernacular chairs, which is where my interest is right now.
After years of making chairs based on historical examples, I encountered modern design rules for them. I gobbled them up. But I found them at odds with my own experiences. This column is my attempt to reconcile them.