Starting today, I am writing a monthly column for Core77, a site that specializes in covering the world of design with a broad perspective.
If you’re looking for woodworking advice, you won’t find it in my column. Instead, I took this assignment because I get to write about design, building stuff, running a business and (yes!) anarchism from a broader point of view than here on this blog.
My first column, The (Mostly Forgotten) Power of Vernacular Design, has some woodworking elements – holdfasts and chairs – but it uses those physical things to explain how I explore early user-made objects. And what we can learn from them.
The column will appear every month. My April column will discuss pricing. Not “how to price your work.” But instead, when to publish your prices and when not to (and the “why” behind each philosophy). I’ve been on both sides of that fence.
Future columns will delve into radical stuff. First, however, I have to convince the readers of Core77 that I’m not a total nut basket.
Earlier this week I was interviewed for the Fine Woodworking podcast by Ben Strano, which was a hoot. (I’ll post links to it next week when it’s released.) Ben and I are always a bit goofy when we’re together, and I said a lot of things I shouldn’t have (including the title to my next book: “Drunk Irishmen Gluing Sticks Together”).
Also, I think he’s going to have to bleep me at least once during the interview.
During the chat, Ben said something like: “You’ve been on a chair kick, lately. Have you given up building flatwork?”
Of course, the entire background of the shot during the interview is a huge dovetailed campaign chest I’m building for a customer. So no, I haven’t given up flatwork. I love it.
The “chair kick” as Ben put it might seem like a new or passing thing – the Dutch tool chest of 2019 perhaps. But those of you who know me well can attest that I have been on a Welsh stick chair kick for more than 20 years.
About 1997 or so I encountered John Brown’s column in Good Woodworking magazine. I was a low-level editor at Popular Woodworking magazine, and we traded subscriptions with Good Woodworking to keep an eye on each other. So I received Good Woodworking every month right to my desk – nice!
John Brown’s column was – by far – my favorite part of the magazine. JB took no prisoners with his writing, and I simply could not believe he got away with writing what he did (insert sympathy for the turners here). But more than that, the Welsh stick chairs he built infected me like a virus. I quickly found out he had written a book on the subject, and I bought it immediately.
That was “Welsh Stick Chairs,” which we now publish here at Lost Art Press.
The words, drawings and step photos in that book were my first introduction to vernacular chairmaking. I adore the book, except for the photos of the finished chair that JB built for the book, his so-called Cardigan Chair.
The Cardigan Chair was nothing like the chairs he was showing in Good Woodworking. Those chairs in the magazine were the ones I fell in love with – primitive and alive. That’s what I wanted to build.
It took me years to find someone who would teach me how to build the early Welsh chair – I had to trek to Canada in March of 2003 where David Fleming taught me and John Hoffman to build our first Welsh chair.
I came home from Canada in 2003 and immediately started building these chairs. And I never stopped.
My chairs sucked. Hard. I didn’t dare show them to anyone outside my family or circle of friends. I had to work out a lot of stuff because I refused to copy anyone’s design. Like John Brown said, every chair should be different and not be built to some blueprint.
That – more than anything – was a difficult pill to swallow. But it has paid off. Sixteen years after building my first Welsh stick chair I now am reasonably happy with the chairs I make (which are still not built with a blueprint – thanks JB).
On Monday, I will teach my first class on building this sort of chair. I am prepared but incredibly apprehensive. We will start with my templates, which I’ve developed during the last 16 years. But I hope that each chair will turn out different.
And I hope that I’ve built enough of these chairs that I’ve found all the mistakes that can be made during their construction. I feel like I’ve made them all. We’ll see.
So if you hate chairs, don’t despair. I’ll always be a generalist when it comes to making furniture. I’ll make anything if it’s in wood. These last couple years have been particularly chair-y as I’ve made some long strides in that department.
Thanks for sticking around. And soon we’ll be talking about workbenches and tool chests again.
If you haven’t noticed, Megan Fitzpatrick has been teaching a lot of tool chest classes. And thank goodness – that means I can focus on chairmaking, working on books and building commissions.
She teaches these chest classes exactly as I would. Well, that’s not quite right. She actually does a better job. Megan loves teaching – she taught at the college level – and her unflagging enthusiasm for the task beats out my retinue of squirrel and clam jokes.
Her tool chest classes at our storefront sell out faster than any other, except for Chris Williams’s Welsh Stick Chair classes.
So I am amazed that Megan’s Dutch Tool Chest class at the Port Townsend School of Woodworking in June hasn’t sold out. It makes me wonder: Do West Coast people hate the Dutch? Do they not like to learn a hearty combination of hand-cut joints? Do they not have tools to store? I just wonder.
If you’ve never been to the Port Townsend school, I think you should. It is one of the most beautiful corners of the world, high above the Puget Sound in Fort Worden. Honestly, if I didn’t have such deep roots in Covington, I’d run away and live there. The gorgeous town has great food, fantastic beer and the most laid-back vibe I’ve encountered. And the deer are so tame you can pet them.
The school and instructor are definitely worth the trip.
People of Earth: If you want to make a workbench that exceeds all your functional and aesthetic desires, I have but one recommendation: The French Oak Roubo Project III. The building session runs from Oct. 14-18 in Barnesville, Ga., in the well-equipped (vast understatement) workshop of Bo Childs.
Registration for this event opens this Friday, March 1. It costs $5,195 for the week and the materials. This is cheap.
The raw material is impossible to come by – thick, well-seasoned French oak. The benchtop will be one slab – no glue-ups. The hardware will be the Benchcrafted good stuff: the Classic Vise, a Crisscross, a Benchcrafted Planing Stop and two Crucible holdfasts.
After one week of work you will have a completed bench, and you will be done building benches for the rest of your life. Read all the details here.
Yes, it is time to sell your plasma, your platelets and that gold-nugget jewelry from your Matlock phase. The supply of this massive old oak is always in question. Every time Jameel and FJ at Benchcrafted finish one of these events, they say: That’s it. There’s no more. Somehow, Bo seems to scrounge more.
Aside from the crazy hard labor and teamwork needed to build these benches, the FORPs end up being about building bonds – as well as workbenches. It’s a mentally and physically intense week that you will never forget. And this will be my third one.
If you can scrounge the money and make the time, you won’t regret it.
I hope to see you in October. I know a great fried chicken place just down the road from Bo’s. So bring the Lipitor.
— Christopher Schwarz
Wesley Tanner at work on his bench during the French Oak Roubo Project.
Hey, wanna see a guy flush several hundreds of dollars and two days of work down the toilet? Read on.
During the last week I’ve been preparing the stock for a week-long class on building a simple stick chair – it’s my first chairmaking course (cue the Depends commercial music). Last week, I bought some ash slabs and have been breaking them down bit by bit to get the right curves for the crest rails, armbows and doublers. And I’ve been trying like heck to squeeze out single-board seats for all the students.
As I started band sawing the seats this morning, I immediately got a sinking feeling. Sections of the boards were cutting like styrofoam. This tree had been on the ground and had some punky patches.
I managed to salvage most of the seats, but there’s no way I’m giving these to students. You don’t want your first chair (or last one) to split apart on the bench. I’m going to have some words with the people at the slab yard. There’s no time to argue with them about this issue right now, so I’m headed to Indiana in the morning to drop several hundred dollars on some new seat material at a different yard.
When this sort of week-altering disaster strikes, I usually switch gears. I go home and do some writing and editing. And some cooking and listening to music.
When I got home today I found a long-awaited package – “Scottish Vernacular Furniture” (Thames & Hudson) by Bernard D. Cotton. This book saved my whole day. It’s a gorgeous full-color work and filled with a wide variety of beautiful items, including stick chairs.
These chairs don’t thrill me like the Welsh varieties, but there are some great examples.
“Scottish Vernacular Furniture” is completely different than Cotton’s other famous book, “The English Regional Chair.” That massive book is like a field guide to spotting chairs and their tiny differences in the wild. While there’s some great information in the book – especially about construction techniques – the chairs themselves do little to inspire me.
“Scottish Vernacular Furniture” is delightful. I imagine I’ll read most of it tonight, as well as complete my editing of Peter Follansbee’s new book.
And then tomorrow I’ll head to the lumberyard – right after selling some plasma.
