We have just delivered a big batch to our warehouse – you can buy yours here. If these sell out, know that we have a second big batch that is almost done. We just need to do some quality control inspections and package them up.
— Christopher Schwarz
Category: Uncategorized
An Uncertain Element
It’s funny how words don’t change but the reader does. About 18 years ago, I can distinctly recall reading John Brown’s column titled “An Uncertain Element of Success” in Good Woodworking (April 2001, issue 107) and being blown away.
The column opens with a poem by D.H. Lawrence (who the heck begins a woodworking column with a poem?) and delves into a discussion of handwork and mistakes of the hand. Because the poem is about as good a chairmaking poem as you’ll find, here it is:
What is He?
What is he?
– A man, of course.
Yes, but what does he do?
– He lives and is a man.
Oh quite! But he must work. He must have a job of some sort
– Why?
Because obviously he’s not one of the leisured classes.
– I don’t know. He has lots of leisure. And he makes quite beautiful chairs.
There you are then! He’s a cabinet maker.
– No, no
Anyhow a carpenter and a joiner.
– Not at all.
But you said so
– What did I say?
That he made chairs and was a joiner and carpenter
– I said he made chairs, but I did not say he was a carpenter.
All right then he is just an amateur?
– Perhaps! Would you say a thrush was a professional flautist, or just an amateur?
I’d say it was just a bird
– And I say he is just a man.
All right! You always did quibble.
John Brown opened this particular column with: “A good friend told me about this poem.” And at the time I thought nothing of it. As it turns out, the “good friend” was Chris Williams, who is writing the book “The Life & Work of John Brown,” which we hope to release early next year.
Chris was more than just a good friend to JB, and he is a chairmaker who is both attached to John Brown through long history and is apart from him in a lot of ways. When we set out to publish this book about John Brown, the early discussions were to provide a woodworking biography of John Brown and show how his work had progressed incredibly since the publication of “Welsh Stick Chairs” in 1990.
What has transpired since is difficult to explain in words. Chris Williams is forever tethered to John Brown, and his forthcoming book will be true to the spirit and memory of this great man.
But what I have learned during the last four years of knowing Chris is that he is more than just an observer of the John Brown story. He is today a very different chairmaker than John Brown. Here’s my best explanation. I’m sure I’ll get it wrong.
Chris is forever indebted to JB. Every sentence he speaks about chairmaking is suffused with the foundation that JB laid. But Chris’s work travels in a different arc than his teacher’s. And this is at the absolute insistence of JB himself. You’ll see all this in Chris’s book.
In the meantime, read the poem a few more times. Scrawl it on the wall of your shop. And wait patiently for Chris’s book.
— Christopher Schwarz
Animals in the Workshop*
*Updated to correct fox-wedged tenon.
The natural world provides a huge vocabulary to help us describe what we do and make. Birdseye can be a pattern in maple, a textile and a chile. In the workshop, names of animals (or parts there of) are a shorthand to describe details on furniture, components of tools and workbench appliances.
With input from Chris Schwarz I put together a collage of animal-inspired woodworking features, tools and one misinformed rabbit.
You are free to print this, however, I can’t guarantee resolution on a very large print.
–Suzanne Ellison
Popular Woodworking Acquired by Woodsmith’s Parent Company
Popular Woodworking Magazine was purchased this month by the parent company of Woodsmith magazine, a division of Active Interest Media called Cruz Bay Publishing, Inc. The purchase price was $1 million, according to court records.
We’ve received a lot of questions from readers. Should I renew my subscription? Will the magazine continue? What will happen to the staff and contributors?
I talked with a well-placed source at AIM today, and he said there have been no decisions made as to what to do with Popular Woodworking Magazine. All options are on the table at this point: Keep the magazine going as-is, fold it into Woodsmith, maintain it as an online entity or other options.
The magazine will continue on in some form, he said. They didn’t simply buy it to kill it. AIM just has to evaluate the situation and decide on the correct path. Woodsmith itself was acquired by AIM in 2015 and was kept in its hometown in Iowa. Since the purchase there have been changes to the magazine’s content and cuts to the staff, all typical results when a magazine is purchased by a new owner.
Popular Woodworking has substantial legacy content that came with the deal, including the intellectual property of American Woodworker, Woodwork magazine and Woodworking Magazine.
Also notable is that Meredith Corp., owner of WOOD magazine, was a bidder in the bankruptcy auction but lost to AIM/Cruz Bay, according to Folio magazine.
— Christopher Schwarz
A New Saw from a Familiar Face
Here’s an interesting piece of news for those who might remember the early days of the internet. Pete Taran, one of the founders of Independence Tool, has begun making new dovetail saws again under the Ne Plus Ultra line.
The Independence saws were the first premium saws on the market in the mid 1990s, well before Lie-Nielsen, Lee Valley and all the individual makers started cranking up their files. Pete founded the company with Patrick Leach, who now sells antique tools. You can read the entire history here, which is from an interview I did with Pete in 2008.
Short version: Independence Tool was sold to Lie-Nielsen and those saws became the first handsaws produced by the Maine company. The Lie-Nielsen dovetail saw still has the same lines as the Independence tool, which are gorgeous.
Pete, one of the most knowledgeable saw people I know, has remained active since selling Independence. He runs the VintageSaws.com site, where he sells refurbished saws and dispenses advice on saw filing.
And now he’s making new saws again. If you never got a chance to buy one of the original Independence saws, this is probably about as close as you can get. I have no plans on testing them (those days are thankfully behind me). But knowing Pete, they will be nothing shy of perfect.
— Christopher Schwarz