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Christian Becksvoort is featured in the Portland Press Herald today, in a Bob Keyes article in the Books section:

“Christian Becksvoort doesn’t want to be the ornery old guy who complains about how things are and wishes for the way they were.

“He’s generally pretty well disposed, balanced and grateful, and at age 69, shows hardly a hint of slowing down. But he can’t help himself when it comes to talking about how it used to be, back in the day when kids were taught in school how to make things out of wood with their hands. They had to know how to measure, cut and hammer and were supposed to be endowed with enough functional woodworking skills to navigate the basics of home ownership and life.”

While the article focuses on Christian’s latest book “Shaker Inspiration,” it’s also a glimpse into his history, life and woodworking aesthetic.

“He also makes reproductions of traditional Shaker pieces and enjoys taking furniture apart to see how it was made. He’s always learning by understanding how other people have solved problems before him. ‘You can tell two or three people worked on a piece. Some dovetails are real crisp. Parts of others might be real sloppy,’ he said. ‘You can learn a lot by taking it apart.’ There’s a humility to Shaker simplicity that Becksvoort treats with reverence. For him, it always comes back to the opposite of what he calls “maximalism, or how much crap can we put on a piece of furniture?”

Click here to read “Practicality, in life, craft, drives Maine’s most famous furniture maker.”

A reminder that Christian will be at Lost Art Press (837 Willard Street, Covington, Ky., 41011) for a book release party on Jan. 12, from 7-10 p.m. (plus he’ll be in and out during the 10 a.m.-5 p.m. open house). Please shoot me an email (if you’ve not already) if you’re attending the evening shindig.

— Fitz

With my kids, I struggle when we talk about their futures. I want to tell them: Do what you love, work really hard and everything will be alright. It’s a great line, but it’s USDA prime horse crap.

My first business – The Kentucky Gazette – failed in the 1990s. And no amount of hard work could save it. I slept under my desk many nights, and I did a good deal of award-winning journalism. There is more to it than hard work, intelligence and talent.

The person who put it best, in my mind, is Doug Martsch, the founder of the band Built to Spill. He is one of my guitar heros and has an independent streak a mile long (which he somehow maintains while his band signed to Warner Bros. records).

I probably will forward this interview to my daughters someday. But it’s far too nice outside today, and they are both in good places with their lives and their work.

So perhaps I’ll disrupt your day instead. (I actually take great comfort from Doug’s words.)

— Christopher Schwarz

These excerpts are from SPIN magazine, an article written by Rachel Brodsky and posted April 14, 2015.

RB: Ira Glass has a quote where he essentially says that every creative person does terrible work in the beginning. Everybody who’s ever wanted to make art is terrible at first. But as long as you create a “volume of work” — even if it continues to be terrible — it will get better. That’s kind of reassuring.

DM: Well, I’m going to go one further and say that it doesn’t get better. You will not get to a point where you write good things. I’m saying that even now, 99 percent of what I write is really stupid, and it didn’t get any better.

What keeps you going with it then?

I can’t do anything else; there is nothing else I can do. I don’t know how to do anything else, and I still like it. Mostly what I’m talking about is the lyrics. The music part of it, it doesn’t come easy for me, but it’s more subjective, so you can get away with more. Whereas the lyrics, lyrics are subjective. But if they’re bad, they can really turn a person off to what’s happening in the whole. If the lyrics are bad, it’s impossible to listen.

Got any career advice for younger indie-rock bands?

I don’t at all. I can tell you about my circumstances, but they’re not going to apply. I just feel like people have something in them that they want to just do, and they’ll do it no matter what anyone says. Or if they need to be advised, maybe it’s not for them.

Yeah, the music industry is pretty much the antithesis of practical.

Yeah, exactly. So the thing I always say is that I’ve been really lucky. That’s my secret, that I got lucky. I’m not saying that there aren’t other things involved, but I wouldn’t be where I was if I hadn’t lived in Seattle at a certain time, met certain people. The people that I started a band with, I just happened to hook up with some people who were a little older than me who put out records themselves. That was a big deal back in those days. For me to work with them was amazing, and that made my whole life.

I wouldn’t say, like, put out your own record, because that might not do it. I wouldn’t say tour a bunch, because that might not do it either. The other thing I say is don’t have any expectations. If you want to do it, just do it. But if you want to make it big, you’re on your own. I have no idea how to make it big. No one knows the secret to that. I mean, I can tell you how to book time in a studio, but that’s neither here nor there.

Katherine has just finished making another big batch of soft wax, and it’s available in her etsy store.

If you haven’t been keeping up with the Soft Wax Saga this fall and winter, she’s made some changes to her production and bottling process – upgrading the packaging and refining the recipe. Details are here.

Counting all the jars she’s sold at our storefront (and to me), Katherine has made and sold more than 1,000 jars since she started mixing the stuff in the basement in April 2016. When we began making the stuff, I helped her bottle every batch. Now she takes care of everything herself, except ordering some supplies where she needs a credit card.

So thanks to everyone who has supported her these last three years and your patience when things occasionally went wrong. Katherine’s learned a lot about dealing with adults because of this business and, of course, I’m happy to see her get a taste of financial independence.

— Christopher Schwarz

While most woodworkers have built a basic bookcase, few have paused to consider the long, complicated and interesting relationship between the history of the book itself and the shelves, cases, stands and lecterns that hold it.

Unlike most furniture, which is designed to suit the human form, bookcases are based on the standard sizes of books, which just might be related to the size of a medieval sheep or calf (seriously).

Kieran Binnie and I have decided to plumb the intertwined history of the book and the casework that displays and protects it. This book, which we are calling “The Book Book,” will explore the origins of bookmaking and the allied development of bookcases, from the time when books were handwritten and chained to the furniture all the way up to the ubiquitous IKEA bookcase.

Along the way, Kieran and I will build some of the more interesting projects we dig up from the historical record. As of now, we have a list of a dozen projects for the book, but I’m sure that will change as our research progresses.

Kieran’s initial explorations have already turned up information about book production that – as a publisher – is quite shocking. Most publishers (me included) think the birth of large-scale book manufacturing occurred when the Chinese and Johannes Gutenberg invented movable type. That’s just not so.

There is lots of evidence that specialized book manufacturing was thriving for hundreds of years before Gutenberg – and not just for royals and the wealthy. And so our search for the earliest origins of the bookcase also will extend way before Gutenberg.

To be sure, we have a lot of work ahead of us. Kieran has completed his work on “The Life & Work of John Brown,” and the remainder of that book is in the hands of Christopher Williams. So Kieran has been diving deep into the historical record and is pulling me along for the ride.

As always, we’ll be sharing the stuff we learn here on the blog. In addition to the research and building, I’m looking forward to designing this book, which will likely resemble some of the early books I got to see on a tour of the Gutenberg museum in Mainz, Germany, in 2017. So expect lots of non-standard typography, layouts and even book structure.

— Christopher Schwarz and Kieran Binnie (visit his blog Over the Wireless)

The winner of a Lost Art Press bandana (man scarf) and Chester Cornett button is ‘speed poet’ Bill Rainford. Within 46 minutes of the posting of the Caption Challenge Bill submitted a four-line poem capturing the pleasures and perils of living in a tree stump:

”There was a young couple who lived in a stump/They had so many children they clearly like to hump/With only one room and only one bed/They should grow an addition as that tree isn’t dead.”

There were 233 entries that arrived before the cut off and there are five that I have selected as Honor Mentions:

Bob Brown submitted, “Man leaves woman in trunk.” A nice murder-mystery vibe and another reminder to me to never buy a very large suitcase.

Samuel Holland submitted, “Why would I ask for a tree bedroom house? It makes no sense.” I like puns and this also reminds me of a guy I ran into once. He kept saying “tree” on the very tree-less waterfront in Jersey.

immltasbi submitted a very short short story that reminded me of Tom Bombadil from ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’: “Let’s cut a tree, to make a home. A branch for spoons and other for the plates…”

Dave was the first to caption ala Chester Cornett: “wey make ur hows ahhom are heit cant B mad.”

Lastly, to award outstanding perseverance, an Honor Mention goes to J.C aka BLZeebub for contributing 14 entries. I want this person on my side in a fork fight.

I will contact the Honorable Mentionees and send you a small thank you for your efforts.

Thanks to all for participating and Happy New Year!

–Suzanne Ellison