When you come to think of it, settles were the only form of traditional oak furniture that were not used for dining; they were for resting, conversing and drinking. As such, they were sociable, not hierarchical. Unlike other forms of seating, settles did not embody the social hierarchy in which great chairs were reserved for those of the highest rank, joint stools served for (almost) everyone else and forms were for the lowliest – servants children and women.
— John Fiske, Antique Collecting magazine, September 2013, and “When Oak Was New: English Furniture and Daily Life 1530-1700.”
When I left the corporate publishing world, I stopped wearing a wristwatch everyday. In fact, I don’t think I’ve worn one this year. This is, of course, a symbolic gesture. We won’t release a book until we are happy with it.
So I can’t ever say when a certain title will be released. However, here are the projects we are working on now and in the coming months.
“Windsor Foundations” (a tentative title) by Peter Galbert
I’m about halfway through editing this book. As a woodworker who loves chairmaking, I can say that this is the best book I have read on the topic. Peter is able to explain complex subjects with clarity and just a few words. Plus, he is drawing all of the illustrations for the book (and there are a ton of them).
“Princips de l’Architecture” by André Félibien, translation by Brian Anderson
This important French book pre-dated Joseph Moxon and explains processes and tools not shown in Moxon’s “Mechanick Exercises.” Brian is finishing the translation, which should be in my hands in a few weeks. Read more on this book here.
“Roubo on Furniture” by Donald C. Williams, Michele Pietryka-Pagán & Philippe Lafargue
The translation of this book is complete and the edited sections are now flowing to me. The scope of this book is remarkable. I think you will find it was worth the wait. We will again publish a standard edition and a limited deluxe edition of this book. I don’t have any more details on pricing or availability.
“Calvin Cobb: Radio Woodworker!” by Roy Underhill
The text is complete and Megan Fitzpatrick is finishing her first edit. We are on the verge of selecting an illustrator. Right, Megan? This book is on track for release in the fall.
“Furniture of Necessity” by Christopher Schwarz
I’m taking the first load of furniture up to the engraver on Saturday. So look for an update on this title in the next week or so.
“The Woodworker: The Charles Hayward Years” by Charles Hayward
This project has been going on for as long as our Roubo translation. We have acquired the rights to publish about 500 magazine articles written and illustrated by Charles Hayward when he was editor of The Woodworker magazine in England. The book will cover joinery, tools, casework, carving, turning and traditional design. The goal is to have this massive tome released by the end of 2014, but you’ve heard that line before.
“Virtuoso: The Tool Chest and Workbench of H.O. Studley” (tentative title) by Don Williams
This book will be out this time next year. That is all.
We also have three other titles that I haven’t announced yet but we have completed contract negotiations with the authors. One of these books is a do-it-before-you-die project for me. So our 2015 is booked up and we are already working on the lineup for 2016.
“The Furniture of Necessity” book will be written, illustrated and printed in the same spirit as the pieces of furniture between its covers. Instead of relying on SketchUp and digital photographs, the engraver will be making the plates for this book using the actual pieces as her guide.
While this will turn me into a furniture mover for the next 12 months, it also will result in illustrations that are rich in detail and unsanitized, unpasturized and un-homogenized. It will be like drinking the design warm from the the teat of (oh stop this line of thought now).
Today I finished up the six-board chest for the book by nailing on the escutcheon plate to the front. There will be no fake keyholes or keys or hat-tips to modern living. These pieces will work in the same way they worked 300 years ago.
I now have two of the pieces complete for the book. Twelve more to go.
There are lots of ways to achieve a cracked paint finish, and I don’t pretend to be an expert on all the different products and methods out there. But I do know what works for me every time, is completely controllable and is done with stuff I always have on hand.
I use a coat of slightly thinned liquid hide glue that I brush on between the base coat and the top coat of paint. As the top coat of paint dries, it cracks to reveal the color of the base coat.
I decided to use this finish on one of the many six-board chests I’m building for “The Furniture of Necessity” book. This chest features an enclosed base and a suite of iron hardware. The finish on this piece is a base coat of flat black latex paint with a topcoat of a flat acrylic blue paint.
Between these two coats is the hide glue, which is the big question in the minds of newcomers to this technique. Here’s how I do it and how I control the crazing effect.
1. Paint the case with your base coat of color. Flat sheens work better than gloss sheens. After the paint is dry, level it with a fine sanding sponge.
2. Get some liquid hide glue. Make sure it hasn’t expired, or the glue will dry slowly or not at all. Pour some glue into a bowl or cup and thin it with a little warm water. You want to get it the viscosity of latex paint – thin enough to brush on but thick enough to cover the base coat of paint.
The thickness of the glue/water mixture controls how much cracking you will get in your top coat of paint. A thick mixture will promote lots of cracks. A thin coat will produce fewer and smaller cracks. If your glue/water mixture is as thin as water, it is too thin. It won’t do much cracking to the top coat. So add more glue to your mixture. Or add a second coat of glue to your project.
I apply the glue with a chip brush and let it dry until I can touch it without removing glue from the surface.
3. Apply your topcoat of water-base paint and use all the same care you would use when applying any finish. Don’t get sloppy. Let the glue do that work for you.
The cracks should start to appear as the paint starts to “flash,” which is the point where it goes from wet to dry. Don’t muck with the finish as it dries. That’s a bad idea, like picking at a scab.
4. If you want to go a step further in adding age to your piece, apply a coat of black wax over the crazed finish after all the paint has dried. The color in the wax will lodge in the cracks and make the piece look both dirty and old.
For the piece shown in this article, I applied a heavy coat of glue to the top to create big cracks. I wanted the base to have more subtle cracks, so I added some warm water to my glue/water mixture before brushing the base.
This chest is complete except for the escutcheon plate. I’ve ordered a few iron German and French ones from Whitechapel Ltd.
If you want to dive deeper into this technique, here are resources I trust (there are some dumb, dumber and stupider methods on the Internet.)
• Glen Huey wrote an excellent article on this technique for the Summer 2008 issue of Woodworking Magazine. He compares hide glue to commercial crackling glazes and barriers formed by white and yellow glues. For a few dollars more, you can order the entire 2008 annual – a very good year.
While the six-board chest is a simple form, there are some variants that make the chest look more high-style, like it might have a fancy bracket-foot base.
Today I decided to convert the chest I built for the Alabama Woodworkers Guild into one of these fancier chests. I removed the moulding that returned down the sides of the chest (see the video here), and made some base pieces to fit under the moulding.
I also removed the crappy hinges I installed in Alabama. One leaf of each hinge was entirely too long. Today I installed iron Lee Valley unequal strap hinges, which look better. Unfortunately, I have some work ahead of me to hide the screw holes from the earlier hinge set.
I also installed a vintage crab/grab lock, which I picked up on eBay for $30 (gloat).
So far, I like the enclosed base, but I don’t want to pass judgment until I get the piece painted. The base coat will be flat black, followed by a coat of thinned hide glue. Then a top coat of dark blue, which will crackle thanks to the hide glue layer between.