That deep exhaling noise you just heard is probably coming from Kentucky, Virginia, Ohio and Maryland. Today we finished initial production of the long-awaited “With All the Precision Possible: Roubo on Furniture.”
Weighing in at 470 pages, this book represents too many hours of work by too many people on too many continents. As I paged through the final product today before sending it to our printers for a quote, I could feel only relief. Not joy. Not satisfaction. (Those feelings might come later.)
Instead, today I have only to tell you something that we rarely say: This project was difficult at every stage. It ground all of us down to a nub. I am glad that I’ll never have to repeat it. And I am fearful to tally up all the money that we spent on it.
Was it worth it? I hope so. Like all of our difficult and protracted publishing projects, I know “Roubo on Furniture” was the right thing to do for the craft and the historical record. But when I count up the hours and calculate the communal grief, I question its value.
All of us can see how much better this project could be if we only had 20 more years to explore this, that or the other thing from the original text.
But some of us won’t be around in 20 years. So here is what we have. It’s not perfect. But it is done with all the precision possible.
In the next week or so, we will offer “With All the Precision Possible: Roubo on Furniture” for sale in our store (and through our network of retailers worldwide). And then we will start work on the deluxe edition of the book (details to follow on that). But as of today I don’t have any more information for you on this book. No prices. No delivery date.
Indexer’s Note: As I reread “With All the Precision Possible: Roubo on Furniture Making” and update the index I can hear my father’s voice say the same things that Roubo wrote. “Draw a plan, measure correctly, cut precisely, hand me that hammer.” OK, maybe not that last one. As he points out how the work should be done Roubo interjects his frustration with joiners, chairmakers and caners when they do not work with precision, or try to improve the quality of their work. He is especially exasperated by carvers. I decided to have a little fun at Roubo’s expense.
In the atelier there was a great commotion in the carver’s corner.
But Monsieur Roubo was not done.
The “Masterpiece” was revealed to the atelier and the chair denizens reacted.
Well past midnight Monsieur Roubo faced a terrible reality and was inconsolable.
We are making the final pass through “Roubo on Furniture” during the next couple weeks. Kara Gebhart Uhl is looking for mistakes that have eluded us for the last three years, Suzanne Ellison is updating the index and I’m building the book’s table of contents.
We plan to go to press with the standard edition of “Roubo on Furniture” in early January with a mid-February release. We also will publish a deluxe edition, which design Wesley Tanner will begin working on shortly. Details to come on how to order the deluxe version.
In the meantime, take a look at the table of contents. Whew.
— Christopher Schwarz
Preface xi
A Key to the Text xiv
The Woods Appropriate for Joinery 3
Section I. The Different Qualities of Wood 3
Section II. Fashioning and Stacking of Wood 7
Section III. The Cutting of Wood 13
The Art of Assembly, its Uses and Proportions 21
Section I. Different Ways to Elongate Wood 25
Some Tools Belonging to Woodworkers, Their Different Types, Forms and Uses 29
Section I. Tools of the Shop 32
Section II. The Tools Belonging to the Workmen 33
Section III. Some Tools Appropriate for Cutting and Planing the Wood 34
The Plate 11 Workbench: How it (Really) Works 38
Make Roubo’s ‘Winding Sticks’ 54
Section IV. The Tools for Marking and Making Joints 59
Section V. The Tools for Fretwork, and those for Cutting the Straight and Curved Mouldings 76
The Art of Drawing 89
Section I. The Way to Take Measurements 89
The Way to Draw the Work on the Plan 93
The Way to Prepare Joinery to Receive Carved Ornaments 95
Section II. The Way to Glue Wood 99
The Way to Construct Columns in Wood; Bases, Capitals, Entablature and Pedestals 103
Section III. The Way of Gluing Curved Wood 109
Joinery in Furniture, in General, and the Different Types 112
Section I. The Tools and Woods appropriate for Furniture 114
Ancient Furniture in General 115
Some Different Types of Seats in Use at Present 119
Section II. The Description of Folding Chairs, Stools, Benches, etc. Their Forms, Proportion and Construction 120
Section III. Descriptions of all sorts of [side] chairs, their decorations, forms, proportions and construction 126
The Way to Prepare Seats to Receive Fabric Ornamentation 135
Roubo on Upholstery 137
Section IV. The Upholstery of Chairs with Caning and the Art of Caning in General 141
The Way to Prepare Seats for Caning 141
Selection of the cane, the way of splitting it and the caners’ tools 145
Various Methods of Weaving and Diverse Operations of the Caner 149
Different Sorts of Seating Forms, Proportions & Construction 155
Roubo, Meet Reality: The Making of A Classical French Chairmaker 164
Section I. Description of all the major seats, like canapés, sofas, ottomans, etc. 181
Section II. Description of Private Apartment Seats, like Bathing-tubs, Demi-bathing tubs, etc. 193
Of Beds in General and the Different Sorts 201
Section I. The Beds of France: Forms, Proportions & Construction 202
Canopies of Beds, Commonly Called Pavilions or Imperials; Their Forms and Construction 210
Section II. Description of Polish-style Beds, their Proportions, Shapes & Decoration 220
Section III. Description of different types of campaign Beds, their shapes and construction 226
Section IV. Description of Daybeds, some Cradles and Cots 235
Tables in General and the Different Types 239
Section I. Different Forms and Constructions of Dining Tables 245
Section II. Game Tables and their different types, forms and constructions 249
Description of a Billiard Table, its form, proportion and construction 249
Description of Gaming Tables, their form, proportions and construction 261
Section III. Tables for writing and their different types, forms and constructions 270
Description of Dressing Tables and Night Tables, and others 293
Description of Screens and Windbreaks; their forms and proportions 296
Case Pieces Known under the General Name of Large Pieces 301
Section I. Description of Armoires; their decoration, proportions and construction 302
Description of Buffets; their forms, proportions, decoration & construction 309
Description of Commodes; their forms, proportions and construction 315
Of Solid Cabinetry Or Assembly in General 325
Section I. Description of the Tools of the Furniture Maker, their assembly and how to use them 327
Section II. Basic Elements on the Part of the Art of Turning necessary for the Furniture Maker 331
Some Screw Taps and Wooden Dies used by Cabinetmakers 343
The Machines Appropriate for Making Fluting for Cylinders and Cones 347
Description of the Machine commonly called the tool for waves 358
Reproducing and Using Moxon’s ‘Waving Engine’ 366
Section III. Different Locksmithing Tools for the Furniture Maker 378
The Way to fit the iron work for cabinetry 392
The Manner of polishing iron and copper relative to cabinetry 402
Section IV. Different Kinds of Solid or Assembled Cabinetry in General 404 Description of different sorts of embroidery frames 405
Description of a printing cabinet 417
Description of Gueridons and Small Tables 427
Description of Different Forms of Desks 430
Necessaries and Other Types of Boxes 437
The book looks spectacular. Crisp and tightly bound. I won’t bore you with the measurements of the fore edge or discuss paper weights. (We hear you, it’s boring.)
This week the warehouse will begin shipping out all the copies that were ordered before the publication date. You should receive an email when that happens, and the book should be in your hands within a week after it ships. Of course, the weather, sunspots and coyote malfeasance could delay that.
The next book in the pipeline is Vol. IV of “The Woodworker” series. This final volume is on workshop stuff (workbenches and tool chests), furniture and its details, plus a few philosophical surprises at the end.
Kara Gebhart Uhl, our managing editor, has finished up her edit of this book. Then Megan Fitzpatrick and I will give it a final once-over before it goes to press. My guess is it will be out in late January.
Also in the works is Mary May’s book on carving the acanthus leaf. That book will go to the designer on Saturday. It might take a while to design the book because the book is quite complex, with hundreds of photos and illustrations.
And finally, “Roubo on Furniture” is dilated at 9cm. Designer Wesley Tanner needs to make some repairs to the layout (don’t ask; it’s painful) and we need to rebuild the index. We are still gunning to get that to the printer before the end of the year and out on the streets by February.
Those are all the books for which I have updates. If you ask: “But what about XXX book?” my answer will be: “Sorry, I don’t know.” All the other books we’ve discussed are being worked on by their authors and are out of our hands.
What I do know is that we have four new book projects to announce in the coming week. Some of them are ridiculously ambitious, plus translations and books that should have been written long ago.
I’m still hoping for a 16-page picture book on happy snails.
This is an excerpt from “Roubo on Marquetry” by André-Jacob Roubo; translation by Donald C. Williams, Michele Pietryka-Pagán & Philippe Lafargue.
Cabinetry panels are ordinarily surrounded by friezes, whether of the same wood oriented in different directions, or in compositions, which is the same thing; in one or the other case, one sometimes puts banding of different colors, surrounded by stringwork, as I have already said. These bandings form a second frame around the panel, the four angles of which one makes various crossovers [where the banding crosses over itself at 90°], as represented in Figs. 1, 2 and 3, which are positioned in the same manner, although different in form, one from the other.
Whether the bandings are simple, as in Figs. 2 and 3, or they are doubled, as in Figure 1, it is always necessary that they be surrounded by stringwork, which separates them from the rest of the work, which is a general rule in all cases. This stringwork is ordinarily white; however, one can make them of other colors, which is not important, provided that their color makes a break with the woods that separate them, and that they be of a wood very exible [pliable] and along the grain, so as to be able to work them very easily, as I will teach in a moment. See Fig. 4, which represents a banding with its two strings, which are glued there, showing as much of the face as the side.
When the colors of the frieze are very different from that of the panels, it happens that the stringwork does not distinguish enough from one or the other color, which obliges putting a double stringwork of two different colors, which are in opposition with the background of the work, which is a different color. Look at Fig. 5, which represents stringwork of five types, namely a double stringwork, side A–B; a triple stringwork, of which the middle is black, side C; another triple stringwork of which the middle is white, side D; a triple stringwork of which the middle is half black and white, side E; finally another type of triple stringwork, of which the three parts that make it are all half-colors, and in opposition one to the other, side F.
Friezes are sometimes made of sections with woods of different colors, which form simple frames, or are filled in across their whole width, by whichever composition. The first way to make friezes, represented in Figs. 6 and 7, is the simplest, and does not require any more care than to trace regular circles or lozenges, whether these friezes be without bandings, as in Fig. 6, or with bandings, as in Fig. 7.
The second way to fill in the interior of friezes is much more complicated than the first, because the space of these last ones being ordinarily limited, the parts that compose the composition of which they are filled in can only be very small. This makes their perfect execution very difficult, especially since one normally puts Greek keys or broken bands there, which are comprised of a large number of different small pieces, as one can see in Figs. 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12.
The Greek keys or broken bands, represented in these different figures, are more or less composed according to the size of the friezes, and are traced in the same manner, as I am going to explain.
When one wishes to trace this sort of ornament, it is necessary first of all, after having traced the middle of the frieze, as line a–b, Fig. 8, to divide the width of the frieze in as many equal parts as the composition requires, seven being the number in this figure [the filled being equal to the empty; in other words, there is balance between the positive and negative space]. This being done, one traces as many parallel lines as there are points in the given division; then one traces these same spaces or divisions perpendicularly, observing that one finds one in the middle of the work, as in this figure; after which one determines the shape of the broken bands, to which one makes as many turns as are necessary to fill in the length of the frieze, observing that at the end, one has made an entire revolution, or at least a happy ending, without having seemed to have been cut, as I had to do in Fig. 8, side G; in that of Fig. 9, side H; that of Fig. 10, side I, and that of Fig. 11, side L.
One inconvenient observation is that if the width of the frieze is bordered, its length cannot be made until after dividing this same width in as many pieces as one judges appropriate, as one could see above. If, on the contrary, it is the length of the frieze that is given, as happens ordinarily, one cannot determine the width until after having made the choice of composition that one wants to use, and of the number of turns that half of the length of the frieze could contain, which will give a number of whichever parts, on which one divides the middle of the length of the frieze, observing still to put one of these divisions in the middle of the length. The division of the length of the frieze once made, one will easily have the width, since the division is already made, repeated as many times as necessary, according to the adopted composition that is given.
What I just said touching on the division of Fig. 8 is applicable to all the others of such types as they can be; that is why I do not speak any further of this, given that only an inspection of the figures can, and even should suffice, for as much as one wishes to pay attention.
Figure 12 represents a type of composition appropriate for filling boxes or squared sections, separated one from the others, as is found sometimes, especially in the corners of friezes, where they can take the place of rosettes or other ornaments.
That deep exhaling noise you just heard is probably coming from Kentucky, Virginia, Ohio and Maryland. Today we finished initial production of the long-awaited “With All the Precision Possible: Roubo on Furniture.”
