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This Saturday and Sunday, I’ll be here at the Lost Art Press Storefront running my second class on building the Cabinetmaker’s Sector. The last class was fantastic and yielded a great batch of new sectors.

I’ve had a spot open up at the last minute, and with an error on our event management website the waiting list was disabled and deleted. So – allow me to extend an invitation to one of you out there to come down this weekend and learn some toolmaking! I’ve copied the class description, tool list and cost below. A quick note on the tool list – because this is last minute, don’t be concerned if you don’t have one or two of the tools. I’ll have plenty of extras to lend out during the class.

If you’d like to attend, let me know by emailing me at brendan@burn-heart.com. I’m thrilled to be teaching this class – and I want to get a full class of new sectors out there into the world!

— Brendan Gaffney

Details below:

Build the Cabinetmaker’s Sector with Brendan Gaffney
June 2-3, 2018
Cost: $300, which includes all materials. (Email me to register a spot at brendan@burn-heart.com)

In this two-day class, students will build their own Cabinetmaker’s Sector, my modernized design for the ancient geometer’s tool, used for drawing, drafting and (in my shop) the layout of dimensions and joinery on woodwork. The class will revolve around the skills of modern hand-tool makers, including careful marking and measuring, mixing metal and wood, hand shaping, finishing and (of course) how to use the tool.

Each student will be provided the wood and the necessary brass hinges and pins, everything needed to produce the sector. The first day will revolve around affixing the brass and wooden tabs into the tools, riveting the leaves together, flattening and lapping the tools and reviewing the principles behind the geometry of the sector. The second day will revolve around shaping the sectors, stamping and inking the sector marks, finishing the sectors and learning to use them in the shop. Every student will leave with a completed sector, plus the knowledge of how it works and how to use it.

Tool list:

Like you, I’ve been bombarded with new privacy policies from Internet companies seeking to comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which went into effect on May 25.

We didn’t have to update our privacy policy because here’s what we do with your data: Exactly nothing.

We do not mine our lists to market things to you. We don’t sell, rent or give out your data to anyone. Heck, we don’t even have the technical capacity to see your credit card number. The only time you’ll hear from us is if there is a problem with your order.

If you subscribe to our blog via e-mail, you can unsubscribe with a click using the link at the bottom of every post (including this one). I’m sure we could make a lot more money if we did some of the things in the previous paragraph, but we couldn’t live with ourselves.

— Christopher Schwarz

My favorite countersink for wood has always been the square-drive ones used with a bit brace. They are easy to control and, when sharp, are quite fast.

I forgot to bring a countersink for a project I was working on today, and the only thing I had on hand were two that were made to cut metal. I have had them for a couple of years and use them to countersink the screws in the metal spiders on the candle stands I make, but I had not tried them on wood. Come to find out they work great in wood, too.

These are available from McMaster-Carr for less than $20 each. The two I have are part numbers 2724A122 (cuts up to 7/16″) and 2724A132 (cuts up to 9/16″). These cut the cleanest countersink I have ever seen in both soft and hard woods. They also work well powered by a simple hand drill.

— Will Myers

A friend recently saw a picture of one of my kitchen jobs and remarked “You get to work in such cool places.” It’s true. I do, some of the time — though let’s acknowledge that one person’s cool is another person’s yawn (or worse).

In the process of collecting images for the book I’m writing for Lost Art Press, I recently received photos of a kitchen I did in Washington D.C. that certainly qualifies as cool in my view, and its coolness has everything to do with the client’s interest in her home’s history. You can read about the job and see more pictures here.

But I imagine many readers would be just as interested in how I came to get such a job in the first place. I don’t live some charmed existence where cool gigs just drop out of the sky into my lap. I’ve spent years cultivating my niche in the kitchen and furniture worlds.

In this case the client, Lauri Hafvenstein, attended a talk I gave on designing period kitchens at a trade show and conference in the D.C. area in 2009. For years I’d seen notices about the Traditional Building Show (formerly called the Restoration and Renovation Conference) in Old-House Interiors and Old-House Journal, which I’ve subscribed to since the mid-1990s. About 20 years ago I decided to apply as a presenter.

I can’t speak about how the event operates today because I haven’t taken part in several years, but in the past, most speakers were not paid to present their work, nor were our travel and accommodation expenses covered. You wrote a proposal and submitted it, knowing that if you were accepted as a speaker you would make the trip on your own dime. Why bother? you ask. This kind of event can be a great way to make professional connections with people in your field. That’s why I presented at three or four of these events over the years.

It can be hard to gauge the return on such investment if you don’t get jobs directly from them. Lauri’s job, the most hardcore period kitchen on which I’ve worked, is the single one I can attribute directly to any of my presentations.* And even if I hadn’t developed other friendships and professional connections over the years through my participation in these events, this kitchen would have made the writing, the travel expenses, and the shop time lost while out of town worthwhile.

— Nancy Hiller, author of Making Things Work 

*Full disclosure: If I recall correctly, she had also purchased and read my book The Hoosier Cabinet in Kitchen History, which made her notice my name in the conference schedule.