All copies of the “Book of Plates” have been claimed. I’ll be in touch with the first 31 people who responded later today.
— Fitz
Category: Uncategorized
‘Question Time’ With Show Notes
Show Notes “Question Time” January 2021
12:41 Introduction
14:16 What are your top five favorite tools?
16:02 Which domestic hardwood is most underused relative to its potential in furniture making?
16:47 How to glue up a workbench top without metal clamps.
18:13 Do you have a preference as to what sort of steel you use in your edge tools?
19:13 For Megan Fitzpatrick: Would you describe how you survive in a hostile testosterone-driven world?
21:32 How do you find your design “voice” in what you create? Is it a natural process? Or is there more intent behind it?
23:36 Do you find much time for furniture projects that you build purely for yourselves?
25:07 Demonstration on riving dry hardwood
28:24 Any obscure modern toolmakers we should be paying attention to?
30:06 What is some of the worst woodworking advice you received?
31:44 How do you get good? How do you progress to the next level?
34:33 Should I buy a combination plane or dedicated planes for grooves and rabbets?
35:51 Chris never seems to back up his work while drilling? How does he prevent blow-out? Are there special bits?
Star-M bits from Workshop Heaven
37:23 Any tips for making a Welsh stick chair into a rocking chair?
38:28 Are there good videos or books on how to take the crispness of your work up to high levels?
40:07 Do you guys miss having people in the shop for classes or open days?
42:11 Can Lost Art Press offer some critique or advice on getting a manuscript ready to publish?
45:07 Can you offer advice on shipping furniture to clients? Building crates? Using LTL services?
46:45 Why are solid-wood drawer bottoms beveled instead or rabbeted?
47:57 Advice for planing out pin knots without tear-out?
49:51 If I have a full set of hand tools, what power tools would you recommend I purchase to make furniture?
51:30 Should I use half-lap joints to join the stretchers to the legs of my workbench?
53:10 How do you find time to shift gears from making furniture to writing?
55:35 What temperature range do you suggest when using hot hide glue?
56:15 When you put a breadboard end on a table, how do you level the breadboard to the tabletop?
57:25 I’m making a field desk and am having trouble with tearout and tool marks on the African mahogany? Any advice?
59:10 What are your favorite woods to use?
1:00:40 What is the minimum air temperature for using your “shop finish” (equal parts varnish, boiled linseed oil and mineral spirits)? Can it be applied outside?
1:02:17 Could you expound on your new children’s books? What age range will they be for?
1:05:29 When I laminate a benchtop, does it matter if the boards are quartersawn, flatsawn or a mix?
1:06:47 What one act of woodworking gives you the most pleasure?
1:07:56 When drawboring a workbench, is there any advantage to using two drawbore pegs instead of one?
1:08:57 What one hand tool would you recommend for a hybrid woodworker?
1:09:20 In your new book on chairmaking, what are some of the tools you find yourself using the most?
1:09:50 Demonstration on making a stick round with handplanes
‘Book of Plates’ Blems – A Rare Offer
As you likely already know, we sell “blems” (books that are lightly damaged, but still utterly readable) only at the storefront, and we always say, “sorry – we can’t ship these.” But given that we won’t have an open house this year until autumn at the earliest, and that we’ve already tapped out the local market, and that we can’t sell these through the online store…
On Monday, Feb. 1, at 10 a.m. Eastern, we will post a rare offer for purchase of one of the 30 or so blemished copies of “The Book of Plates” that are in the basement at the storefront, and we will mail them out in USPS large flat-rate boxes. The cost – $70 – includes the boxing and shipping. I’ll respond to the first 30 or so people who email at 10 a.m. Monday and not before (as many people, in order of emails received, as there are books available) to collect shipping and payment information. Payment will be via PayPal (though you don’t need a PayPal account). All sales are final. No exchanges or returns.
Please note: We can only ship these books to a U.S. mailing address. We cannot send them outside the country. Wir versenden nur in die USA. Nous expédions uniquement aux États-Unis. Біз тек Америка Құрама Штаттарына жеткіземіз.
These books will be available on a first-come, first-served basis, via an email to me – and I will not entertain any offers that arrive in my in box before 10 a.m. Eastern on Monday morning. I’m letting y’all know ahead of time in case you want to be waiting by your computer when they go on sale.
The book features all of the drawings (called “plates”) from André Roubo’s masterpiece “l’Art du menuisier.” There are detailed drawings of every kind of furniture form, plus tools, interior trim and architectural woodwork, carriage making, marquetry and garden furniture. It’s a fascinating and illustrated look into the 18th century world of material culture and woodwork.
This is a huge book – 11″ x 17″. Printed in the United States on #100 Mohawk paper. Sewn and bound in Michigan. Beautifully made. And it will not be reprinted. The damage to these copies could include a crushed edge or two or a warped cover. Or both. But all the pages are there, and all the pictures are pretty.
— Fitz
p.s. My email is in the “via an email to me” in the link above – but it’s fitz@lostartpress.com. Again, though, don’t email me about this until Monday at 10 a.m.
Live on Saturday Morning
Our first “Question Time” livestream is at 11 a.m. (Eastern) Saturday. We’ll broadcast here from the shop and answer the questions you sent in beforehand.
Megan Fitzpatrick estimates we received 125 questions. Yikes.
She’s been answering directly the ones that are narrowly focused. And if we don’t get to your question during the live session, we’ll try to address it on the blog in the coming weeks.
If you aren’t able to watch us live, we’ll post the Q&A session along with the questions (and timecodes) so you can sort the wheat from the chaff.
You will be able to watch the livestream here. Above is a window where it also will be broadcasting. And we’ll post another portal on the blog on Saturday morning.
Why are we doing this? We like to experiment with new technology to help expand the woodworking community. For example, we experimented with Instagram and now reach 114,000 people, many of them beginners. That’s a success, and so we put effort into it every week. Other experiments, such as a forum, didn’t take off and so we snuffed them out.
My hope is that we will do a livestream every month. Some might be bench demonstrations, some will be Q&A, and I hope that some of them will be interviews with our authors. If we do a good job and attract an audience, we’ll put more effort and time into it.
There won’t be ads or sponsors. We won’t be selling you a multi-level awl program. No animals will be harmed, though we hope Bean the three-legged shop cat will bless us with a cameo.
— Christopher Schwarz
Origin Book of the ‘Nicholson Bench’
Peter Nicholson’s “The Mechanic’s Companion” is one of the landmark English-language books on woodworking and related building trades. First published in 1812, it’s an invaluable treatment of period techniques, with 40 detailed plates that offer an excellent look of the tools of the time, and a thorough review of the geometry you need for all types of construction.
You’ll find useful primary-source information on how to use traditional joinery tools at the bench. That’s because Nicholson – unlike other technical writers of the time – was a trained cabinetmaker, who later became an architect, prolific author and teacher. So he writes (and writes well) with the authority of experience and clarity on all things carpentry and joinery. For the other trades covered – bricklaying, masonry, slating, plastering, painting, smithing and turning – he relies on masters for solid information and relays it in easy-to-understand prose.
“Mechanic’s Companion” went through a number of printings, both in England and in the United States; this reprint is of the 1845 U.S. edition, which includes information on mid 19th-century New York City building codes (which are – to me, anyway! – fascinating). I spent a month or so in early 2018 scanning the pages of the original (at high and crisp resolution, of course) and cleaning up the foxing, as well as rebuilding many broken letters and words, pixel by pixel. My aim was to present as clean a book as possible. (I also bumped up the size by 10 percent, just to make it a little more readable.)
But after two years of fulfilling orders out of my living room and dining room – and becoming increasingly busy with freelance work for Lost Art Press and others – I decided my time and floor space could be better spent. So, Lost Art Press picked up the remainder of my print run, and will keep this important book in print (something I would not have been able to do on my own).
Like all Lost Art Press books, “Mechanic’s Companion” text is printed on acid-free paper in Smythe-sewn signatures that are reinforced with fiber tape. The interior is then wrapped in hardcover boards and cotton cloth. The book is produced entirely in the United States.
— Fitz