A quick note: Katherine has just posted about 32 jars of Soft Wax 2.0 in her store. You can read all about it in her etsy store.
Also, we have now boxed up all the special Anthe Lump Hammers, and we found we had a few extra to sell. You can visit our store here to read about them and consider purchasing one, which helps fund the restoration of our new building.
Our customer service lines are buzzing with customers asking what will happen to the 837 Willard St. storefront when the Anthe building comes on line. Will people still be able to visit the Willard Street shop? Where will the books, tools and apparel be sold? What about the woodworking classes?
Here’s the plan as of now.
Nothing will change at Willard Street for at least two years. The first phase of construction at the Anthe building is to build and perfect our fulfillment center. That requires money and work and cleaning and infrastructure. This phase is the most important to us. It will allow flexibility and a more personal touch when filling orders. And it will save us a load of money.
The second phase is to get the storefront up and running at the Anthe building, which is at 407 Madison Ave. (a short walk from Willard Street that I make every day). People want to visit and buy our stuff in person, and a dedicated storefront allows this.
The third phase is to build new editorial offices, photography studios and workshop spaces on the second floor. It’s important to me that all of us work together. Help each other. Try to make the company better and the Anthe building a better place to work. Megan and I will help fill boxes with orders at peak times. At slow times, the fulfillment people will help us in the workshops and creating content.
I do not like hierarchy.
Through all this, the Willard Street storefront will carry on as a classroom and storefront for Lost Art Press and Crucible. People can visit both places if they want – though there’s no guarantee who will be at Willard Street at any particular time.
We don’t have any plans beyond what I’ve written above. So any questions beyond this post have this answer: We don’t know.
So if you are planning on visiting our Willard Street storefront this summer, please do. We are there typically from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Monday through Saturday (we are closed on Sunday). As always, knock on the front door, and we will be happy to let you in and give you a tour.
— Christopher Schwarz
Welcome to the LAP Open Wire, where we endeavor to answer your questions about woodworking – plus our tools, books and apparel.
Here’s how it works: Type your question in the comment field. I will do my best to answer it. It is that easy.
Before you ask a question, please read this.
So here we go…. Note that comments for this entry will close about 5 p.m. Eastern.
— Christopher Schwarz
It’s been one bonkers week since we closed on our purchase of the Anthe Building, which will become our new headquarters here in Covington, Ky. (If you don’t know what I am talking about, click here.)
This blog entry is a brief update on a shed-load of work. But before you read further, please take a moment to digest the following.
This project is being done to code by licensed and bonded professionals. We are following all applicable federal, state and local guidelines. If you feel compelled to make some comment like “that’s not safe,” “that’s not right” or “you should do this instead” know that the world will never see your wisdom. I’m going to delete it. The only thing worse than armchair woodworkers are armchair plumbers, electricians and general contractors. Thank you.
We have three big goals before June 1, which is when we plan to start fulfilling all orders from here. (Note, we are actually already fulfilling some orders from here at Willard Street, breaking in the shipping software and building new processes.)
This week was all about No. 1. How do we remove 125 years of oil from the floors and walls? The answer: Dawn Degreaser. I have never worked with the stuff before, but it is amazing. The clean-up crew wets the surface with the degreaser at full strength. They wait 10 minutes. Then they scrub with a stiff-bristled brush (or an electric floor scrubber). The sludge is sucked up in a shop vacuum immediately and disposed of properly.
The difference is shocking. In one week we went from a room that reeked of oil to barely a wisp of smell. In fact, the degreaser is working so well that we think we can use the original floor with a few repairs and patches, instead of covering everything with a floating floor.
Also in the process, the carpentry crews have been dismantling the modern improvements made to the building (I have been helping a bit because I love this process of discovery). Also, the HVAC crew put in the three mini-split heads for the first floor.
And we are starting to draw and plan for No. 3 (the bathroom).
What about No. 2 (paving and a new rear door)? Glad you asked. Site-prep and pouring begin next week. Then the rollup door can be installed and the broken modern metal doors at the back can be removed and sent to the scrap yard.
— Christopher Schwarz
Megan and I are now filming and editing a long-form video about how I build a Gibson chair, one of my favorite Irish chairs.
The video, which should be released late next week, will include a pdf of the full-size templates needed to build the chair, plus drawings for the simple jigs I use, plus a cutting list and sources for all the tools and equipment shown in the video.
The video will be $50 for the first 30 days it is on the market. After that it will be $75.
Gibson chairs look unusual to people at first. They are low and have a back that rakes at 25° – a shocking tilt angle. It might seem like a chair for sleeping, but I assure you it’s not. It sits very much like a comfortable comb-back chair. In fact, in Ireland, these are sometimes called “kitchen chairs” because they are used for eating in the kitchen.
My version of the Gibson is a little different than the originals (we hope to do a book dedicated to the chair sometime in the future). Like almost all traditional Irish chairs, Gibsons have a flat seat. The seat in this video will be saddled, both for looks and comfort. I don’t think the form really needs a saddle, but it does look like a more expensive chair.
I’ve also made a few other small alterations here and there to the chair that I explain in the video.
I’ve tried to make the construction process as accessible as possible. All the mortises are straight holes (no tapered joints), so you can use augers you already own. The tenons are made with plug/tenon cutters chucked in a cordless drill, which are cheap and easily available. (Or you can use a Power Tenon Cutter from Veritas, which I also show in the video.) There is no steambending. You don’t need a lathe or a shavehorse. Most of the work is at the bench or the band saw.
Like all our videos, this one will have no Digital Rights Management (DRM) nonsense. So you will be able to download the video and put them on any of your devices, including your phone, laptop and pad.
— Christopher Schwarz
P.S. The next video will be on building my hobbit chair. I’ve convinced myself that it is different enough than Bilbo’s and I won’t be thrown into the fires of Mordor, which are filled with lawyers.