Lost Art Press

Category: American Peasant

Now Shipping: ‘American Peasant’ (the PDF is Free)

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My latest book, “American Peasant,” is now shipping from our Covington warehouse. The price is $37 plus shipping. All copies purchased from us are autographed.

If you can’t afford the book, or aren’t sure it’s for you, the pdf of the complete book is free. You can download it by clicking this link. This is not a trap. You don’t have to register or give up your email. Just click this, and the pdf will download to your device. No strings attached.

The pdf is free now and for always. Tell your friends.

A quick note for those who bought merchandise to support our renovation of the Anthe Warehouse, your book is on the way. Check the bottom of this entry for details.

What’s the Book About?

“American Peasant” is an introduction to a style of peasant furniture and decoration that is almost unheard of in the Americas. Built primarily with tongues, grooves and pegs, the furniture is frequently engraved with geometric symbols that beautify the piece and protect its owner.

With this book, you will learn to build 10 simple pieces using common tools and whatever lumber is on hand. And you’ll learn to engrave the pieces using nothing more than a cheap craft knife and a vinyl flooring cutter. (We were so thrilled with this tool that we now make a commercial version of it.)

In addition to furniture making, “American Peasant” delves into other areas of the craft that will make you a more independent woodworker. Learn to make your own commercial-grade glue using only three ingredients (food-grade gelatin, salt and water), all of which you can find at the grocery store. The glue is strong, reversible and non-toxic (it’s edible, though we don’t recommend eating it).

You can make your own finish using beeswax, linseed oil and citrus solvent. This non-toxic finish is easy to apply and to repair. Plus, it looks better with age and use.

Finally, you’ll learn the language of the engravings, which come from Scandinavia, Eastern Europe and the U.K. These geometric engravings can protect a loved one from sickness, guard your valuables and grant good fortune to others (there are no negative engravings or spells in this book). 

It’s the most beautiful book I have written, designed and printed. The cover is our first two-color diestamp, and the plant did a beautiful job of stamping it extra-deep so the cloth has a fantastic texture (“…with the look and feel of hand-tooled leather.”).I hope you enjoy it.

Anthe Supporters – Read This!

If you were one of the 445 people who purchased a special class, a spell panel, lump hammer or book that supported our effort to fix up our Covington warehouse, this section is for you.

Last month I sent out a couple emails to all of you. If you didn’t get one, check your junk folder. I have signed all your books, personalized them to you and they are shipping now (I labeled a bunch of them this morning). If you think or know you are entitled to a book but you haven’t received an email, don’t leave a comment here. Instead, reach out to help@lostartpress.com. They will help sort it out.

Customer service stuff aside, thank you – all of you. Your purchases raised about $120,000 that was beyond helpful.

And Hats!
We also have a batch of new hats in the store. These are navy blue with our dividers embroidered in white. These are unstructured, soft and have a metal clasp to adjust them. We got a special deal on them and were able to lower the price by $5.

News: ‘American Peasant’ Release, FWW Cover & The Stick Chair Journal

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The cover of “American Peasant.” Coming out this week.

Sometimes we have so much stuff going on at Lost Art Press that I need to condense it all into one brief blog entry. Here we go.

‘American Peasant’ Released Early

My latest book, “American Peasant,” shipped from the printer 10 days early and will arrive in our Covington warehouse on Monday or Tuesday. We’ll open up ordering as soon as we can. The book will be $37. It is the prettiest book I’ve ever written, designed or published. I hope you like it.

FWW issue 311

On the Cover of Fine Woodworking

I am on the cover of the latest issue of Fine Woodworking magazine, which was a surprise and shock. I wrote an article on building Irish stick chairs for the magazine, which I worked on with Anissa Kapsales. I had no idea that I was going to end up on the cover, and Anissa kept it a secret.

The article turned out quite well (I think). And FWW has contracted me to write three more articles for future issues. I was wary about getting back into the magazine publishing world, but the good staff at the magazine has made it a pleasure. And fun.

The Stick Chair Journal No. 2

The second issue of The Stick Chair Journal has gone to press and should be released in early August. The cover article in the issue shows how to build the Hobbit-esque chair from “The Lord of the Rings” movies. There’s also an article about the first John Brown chair made in America. And a new technique I’ve worked out that makes assembling stick chairs much easier.

Other news….

We have new Lost Art Press hats that will go up for sale this week. They are navy blue and feature our dividers embroidered in white.

Whitney Miller has just finished editing her video on building a Swedish Tool Chest. We hope to have that up for sale this week, too.

And also worth noting: We have started production on our new Exeter-pattern nail hammers. Sexy, sexy, sexy.

Our Exeter-pattern nail hammer.

The American Peasant Heads to Print

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A mock-up of the two-color die stamp of “American Peasant.” The swirls are some of the engravings/spells shown in the book.

We just sent the “American Peasant” book to press, but it’s a lot like landing in a foreign country (yay!) and having to wait behind 1,000 people at the immigration window (ugh).

Normally, our books come out about five or six weeks after we send them to press. But these are not normal times. Thanks to the latest brood of cicadas venture capital ridiculousness, all our books are in a long queue at the printer. Right now, the best they can say is: Maybe it will be done in August or September. Maybe later. Maybe sooner. Can’t say.

I have no desire to change printing plants. We’ve worked with this one for 17 years, and I know exactly what their sheet-fed presses are capable of, and how to get the best results out of the different papers they stock. This hard-won knowledge keeps the cost of printing and thus the retail price down.

So we will just have to wait. It took two years to write “American Peasant,” so waiting a couple months shouldn’t be a big deal. Right?

In the meantime, above is a preview of the cover (no, I have not been taking street drugs), and some of the images and spreads from the book; the gorgeous opening images of each project are by Narayan Nayar.

I’m excited to see “American Peasant” released into the wild, but until then, I’m working hard on issue 2 of The Stick Chair Journal.

— Christopher Schwarz

Update on the Blog & Substack

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The last year has been chaotic here at Lost Art Press as we doubled in size, bought a warehouse, fixed it up and launched new ways of teaching people the craft. This blog entry is a brief update on… everything. But especially the “teaching people the craft” part.

First let me say that printing good books will always be my No. 1 priority. Right now we have so many books backed up on our printing schedule that we are a bit frustrated. Printing schedules that are out of our control have stalled three books that should – by all rights – be out right now.

We have poured that frustration into other worthwhile projects. Most of that effort has been with our three “Substacks.” Substacks are just fancy blogs. They allow you to charge a subscription fee, and Lost Art Press gets the lion’s share of the money. What we like about Substack is that we can offer a good balance of free and paid content. We want everything to be free, of course, but we also have six stomachs that now rely on this business.

If you have missed our Substack stuff, here is a rundown.

The American Peasant

This is my unfiltered self. It’s PG-13. And yes, it’s all about woodworking, but it also delves into other issues – mostly deconstructing the BS that permeates our craft. I also post entire chapters of my forthcoming works. Plans, drawings, everything. Readers there have already read my next book “American Peasant” (and have helped to make it better). Right now we’re building a Hobbit Chair together. 

You can subscribe for free or pay $5/month. About half my Substack posts are free. And about half of each paid post is available to free subscribers to read. There’s a lot of stuff to read – more than 260 posts. And it’s some of my writing that I dislike the least.

Never Sponsored

Megan Fitzpatrick and I have collected a lifetime of knowledge about tools. We reviewed them for magazines. We see hundreds of student tools. And we – weirdly – still keep up with the industry out of habit. Our knowledge is mostly useless for publishing books. Spitting out model numbers and details of how certain motors work isn’t useful in a book. It becomes quickly outdated.

But what we know is great for a Substack. So Megan and I are opening our veins and offering our opinions on tools and other products without the threat of any flack from manufacturers. We don’t take free or discounted tools. We don’t do affiliate programs. The tools we own we paid full price for. And I’ve been at this since 1996.

Like “The American Peasant,” about half the posts are free. Paid subscriptions are $5/month. 

The Anarchist’s Apprentice

Our third Substack is the most unusual writing exercise I’ve ever been involved in. This year we hired Kale Vogt, an aspiring chairmaker, to work here. And I’m about to take Kale on as an official “apprentice.” This Substack is journal entries written by me and Kale (and sometimes Megan) about the process. 

It’s messy. Sometimes difficult. But also a chance for everyone to grow. 

The Substack covers a lot of ground, from how to teach the basics to the economics of running a furniture shop to …. Who knows?

“The Anarchist’s Apprentice” is the start of something that I suspect will be important. Or it will crash and burn. Either way, you can be ringside. Half the posts are free. The rest are $5/month.

So Why?

A few people have asked us why we don’t just post all this stuff here on the Lost Art Press blog?

Well, it would be too much – multiple posts a day. And the tone of the blog would flop all over the place. We would chase away readers with my foul mouth, and we would enrage manufacturers with our tool reviews (which I’m actually OK with).

This blog is about straight-ahead woodworking. I’ve moved my personal stuff to “The American Peasant” (much to the relief of some of our readers). The three Substacks are a way for you to pick and choose what you like. Subscribe to all three for free, and you will get a huge amount of information. Pay if you want more.

News About This Blog

This year has been a technical pit of quicksand for this blog. To remedy the problems, we have moved the blog to a self-hosted site (long overdue) and switched our email notification system to Mailchimp (also long overdue).

I promise we are not trying to make things worse for you, or add layers of advertisements and marketing. We just need to be able to send an email to you and know that it went out. That’s what this is about.

So email notifications about new blog entries will come from Mailchimp instead of WordPress.That’s really the only change.

OK, time to sign off on this administrivia update. And get back to the bench.

— Christopher Schwarz

More Classes with Chris (Near & Far)

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I have two more classes this year that have open spots. One in Germany, and one in Indiana.

I’m teaching people to build the Dutch Tool Chest in Munich July 14-16. You can register and read more about the class here. The class takes place next to Dictum’s lovely Munich showroom and is easy to get to via train. There’s lots of good food and touristy stuff in the area for your family to do while I yell “Schneller! Schneller!” as you dovetail.

The other class is on how to build a peasant cupboard on July 27-28 at the Marc Adams School of Woodworking in Franklin, Indiana. You can read more about the class and register here. This is a fun class because the cabinet construction is the quick part. Then we paint the face frame, learn about spells and engrave them.

I probably will announce two more chair classes for this year in the coming days. One in London and one here. The class here will likely be for an Irish armchair with a saddled seat.

— Christopher Schwarz