Lost Art Press

Category: The Stick Chair Book

I Do Not Recommend it

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Almost every time I post a photo of one of my chair seats in progress, I get this question: “Do you use an angle grinder and (insert spinning tooling name here) to rough out your seats?”

I answer: “No, I use a scorp.” But I don’t really talk about why.

I think this sort of spinny, toothy tooling is inherently dangerous. It is difficult to make operations “safe” with it. And if someone ever hurt themselves after seeing me use the tool, I would be crushed.

I own one. I bought it years ago to experiment with after seeing several chairmakers use them in videos. I followed all the rules. Watched videos from the manufacturers. I practiced on scraps for a few weeks during my down time.

Then I used one – cautiously – to make the dugout chair that everyone in the world seems to think is ugly. Working that stump for hours and hours got me comfortable with the tool. After that, I practiced saddling a few scrap seats from the burn pile.

Then I put the thing away and haven’t touched it until I took these photos.

I think it’s too dangerous for my tastes (your attitude might differ). I am perfectly happy with the speed and accuracy I get from a scorp. If I needed to go into production mode with chair seats, I’d buy a CNC router instead of an angle grinder and knee-biter.

I believe safety is the responsibility of the individual. And this individual won’t use that sort of tool.

I’m not looking for an argument. This is simply a public service announcement, so I’m keeping the comments closed. Feel free to skewer me on your own blog.

— Christopher Schwarz

Maybe? Try That Again

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I have one important piece of advice when I teach our authors to take photos, junior editors to design book pages or students to design chairs. Here it is: Never trust your first instinct. Force yourself to take another photo from a different angle. Make an alternative page layout. Try a different arrangement of sticks.

Sometimes my first instinct is correct. But (for me, at least) I’m batting .500 with my first instincts. So I know that if I make a second attempt at something, then about half the time I will make that thing better.

Here’s a real-world example from earlier in the week. I’m working on a new stick chair design that has seven back sticks and three short sticks under each arm. After working out the spacing and splay of the long back sticks, I began playing around with the short sticks.

I do this with bamboo skewers and sticky putty. You know, the stuff you used to hang the “Daisy Duke” poster over your bed.

The position and angle of the short sticks changes the way the chair looks. It can look formal. It can look like it’s about to pounce on a victim. Or that the sitter is in a Maxell cassette commercial.

I worked out one arrangement that I liked on one side of the chair. Then I forced myself to make a second arrangement on the other side of the chair.

After that, I walked away for a bit to do something else pressing. I always do this if I have the time. It’s ideal to walk into a room and “encounter” the two designs after a break. That usually gives me my answer. 

Sometimes, however, the best design is obvious, and I plow forward at full speed.

I’ll leave you to decide which of these two designs you like better.

— Christopher Schwarz

What’s Your Chair’s Janka Rating?

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During the last two decades I’ve entered the orbit of many chairmakers who make Jennie Chairs (from “Make a Chair From a Tree”) and Windsor/Forest chairs. Years ago, I was in a gaggle of them, and they started talking about how little their chairs weighed.

I learned that Jennie Chairs that have been stripped down to their essence can weigh about 5 lbs. A few people have broken that barrier and gotten them below 5 lbs., but it’s apparently tricky to do it without splitting the posts during assembly.

Some Windsor/Forest chairmakers have similar obsessions with making chairs that weigh as little as possible. Because of the massive and solid seat, however, the makers I have talked with usually aspire for about 8 lbs. of material.

How much do my stick chairs weigh? I had no idea until people started asking me. Sure, I’ve shipped a bunch of them, so I know how much the crate, chair and packing material weighs (about 60 lbs.). But the chair itself? It weighs about yea much. As much as a chair made of oak, walnut or cherry should. A child, adult or aged person can move it around without too much trouble. You can pick it up. You can stand on it. It’s not made out of collapsed star material.

I didn’t know there was a contest to make the waif-iest chair possible. (Of course, I’m oblivious to sports. So it might be a personal defect – I’m missing the “competition” gene.)

Recently some Jennie Chair makers were again chatting with me about how incredibly lightweight their chairs were. One of them asked me how much my chairs weighed. 

“Weight?” I replied. “Bah. What’s more important is the pH of your chair. If you don’t understand the ‘potential of hydrogen’ of your chairs, then I don’t even know what to say.”

This is why I don’t get many invitations to parties.

My chairs weigh about 15 lbs. Unless you have had surgery recently, you should be able to pick them up OK.

— Christopher Schwarz

Going a Little Soft

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Welsh wool blankets at the National Wool Museum.

As a woodworker, sometimes I ask too much of the wood.

Instead of just putting a cushion on a chair, I’ll do everything possible to force the wood to be as comfortable as possible. Naked. With no help from anything cloth, leather, foam, feathery or furry. So, I have spent years (almost two decades) learning to saddle seats – plus dial in the angles of the back and arms and seat deck – to increase the chair’s bare comfort.

But while looking at hundreds of historical chairs, I’ve seen hints of a reality that I should acknowledge more often. When it comes to comfort and warmth, wooden chairs are often assisted by wool, animal skins and cotton (to name a few).

For several years I’ve encouraged readers and customers to use sheepskins on their wooden chairs, which add lots of warmth and comfort (my favorite source for these is Driftless Tannery).

A Welsh interior at St Fagans National Museum of History.

If sheepskins add too much bulk or warmth, try a wool blanket. While I was visiting St Fagans National Museum of History, I was struck by how much of the seating there was displayed as covered in woolen blankets or quilts.

While some might be put off by covering your work with a blanket, I think they are a nice complement to the woodwork –  two colorful, renewable, durable and handmade objects working together to add ease and beauty to our lives.

A Forest chair in Shelburne, Vermont.

This relationship between blankets and chairs is old. Recently Angela Robins, sent me a photo of a Forest Chair in Shelburne, Vermont, that had been modified to wrap the sitter in blankets and warmth. I love its almost skeletal appearance – and it looks naked without its coverings.

Sometimes the union between blankets and chairs is somewhat hidden.

One of the small nails on the underside of a chair’s armbow.

Antiques dealer Tim Bowen in Wales recently pointed out some small nails on the underside of the arm of a stick chair. The nails’ heads protruded slightly, perhaps about 1/8”. And they weren’t structural or part of a repair.

Tim said he sees often finds these nails on old chairs and they are covered in strands of wool or other cloth. He suggested the nails acted as hooks to help keep blankets in place on the chair.

So during my most recent trip to Wales I brought back a lovely Welsh wool blanket. And I have a box of tiny old headed nails – more like escutcheon pins, really – with square heads. Just like the nails that Tim showed me.

It’s time to introduce my chairs to a new friend from the sheep world.

— Christopher Schwarz

An Introduction to Stick Chairs

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If you or a woodworking friend are wondering what the heck a stick chair is, we’ve made a page that is a quick but complete introduction to the form. It also explains how all our stick chair products relate to the form. So you can better decide if you should go Old School (“Welsh Stick Chairs” by John Brown) or American (“The Stick Chair Book“) or historical (“The Welsh Stick Chair: A Visual Guide“). So yes, the page is a bit commercial. Selling books keeps the lights on here at the blog.

Check it out here.

— Christopher Schwarz