Lost Art Press

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LAP: Where to Stay, Where to Eat, What to Do

Posted on by Lost Art Press

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If you’re from out of town and thinking of visiting the Lost Art Press storefront for an open house or for a class, read on.

Where to Stay
Just a short walk from the Lost Art Press storefront (at 837 Willard St.) is Hotel Covington – a very nice hotel in a fully renovated historic property, with an excellent restaurant. (And no, we don’t get kickbacks.) Other options are to stay at one of the nice and fairly inexpensive chain hotels on the Covington riverfront, book a room through AirBnB, Vrbo or stay in downtown Cincinnati.

The chain hotels on the Covington riverfront include: Hampton Inn, Courtyard, Extended Stay, Marriott, Embassy Suites and Holiday Inn. All are clean, safe and offer decent amenities within walking distance.

If you opt to stay in Cincinnati, I highly recommend the 21c Hotel. It is a full-service hotel. Amazing restaurant (the Metropole). Fantastic breakfast. Great bar and bartenders. And there’s a semi-secret rooftop bar (the entrance is in the alley). If you’re a fancy lad or lass, you’ll love the Hilton Netherland Plaza. And even if you’re not fancy, the incredible Art Deco bar is worth a visit. Another four-star option (also with a good restaurant) is The Cincinnatian. I’ve never seen the rooms there, but I’ve heard good reports.

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A look down Pike Street.

Where to Eat
To make this list manageable, I’m going to focus only on establishments that are in Covington and downtown Cincinnati. If I covered other neighborhoods, it would be a book.

Covington
Otto’s: This is one of my favorite places for lunch, dinner and brunch. It has a small menu of Southern food, but everything is outstanding. Get the tomato pie for lunch. Otto’s is also one of my contenders for best burger in the city.

Bouquet: Great wine bar and good food made with local ingredients. I love the trout.

Gutierrez Deli: A small, family owned Mexican grocery and carry-out deli that makes the best birria we’ve ever had.

Olla: Owned by the same family as Gutierrez deli, with even more delicious Mexican offerings and table service.

Frida 602: A bustling Mexican place that specializes in mezcal and tacos. Get the queso. You’ll thank me.

Cock & Bull: Decent fish and chips and a draft beer list that is insane (Delirium Tremens on draft – dang).

Libby’s Southern Comfort: If you like fried chicken (and how can you not?!), go here. And get a bourbon slush, too.

Goodfella’s Pizza and the Wiseguy Lounge: Downstairs is a small pizzeria with New York style pizza (yes, you can order a slice) and beer. Upstairs is one of the best bourbon bars in the state and a great place to relax.

Crafts & Vines: One of the friendliest bars in the city. Wine on draft (you read that right). Plus an inventive beer selection.

Butler’s Pantry: An upscale mini-mart that has a fine selection of bourbon, as well as a tasty array of sandwiches.

Spoon Kitchen & Market: A small grocery that offers a good selection of sandwiches, flatbread and grain bowls.

Old Kentucky Bourbon Bar: An astonishing bourbon selection. The patio out back is one of my favorite places to hang out with a crackling fire and a bourbon.

Larry’s: A “dive bar.” In quotes because it still looks like a dive bar, but it smells a lot better. Probably due to the delicious tater tots and hot dogs they serve up. The red beans and rice is also delicious.

Covington Coffee: Super-friendly family-run place. Great pastries and the best bagels (Lil’s) in the city.

Chako Bakery Cafe: Fantastic, family-run Japanese bakery and restaurant (within easy walking distance of LAP).

Gyros on Main: Good gyros (natch) and good shawarma. And open on Mondays (unlike many other restaurants around here).

Lorenzo’s Deli: Made-to-order sandwiches. So far, we’ve had only the Italian and the reuben; both are delicious.

Point Perk: My other favorite coffee shop in town. The hours are limited, but the espresso and chai drinks are fantastic.

Coppin’s in the Hotel Covington: This hotel is the jewel of the city. The restaurant and bar are highly recommended for breakfast, lunch, dinner and brunch. Get the corn fritters, the 16 Bricks bread and … oh just get everything.

The Standard: A pub-style menu served up in a former gas station (with fun auto-mechanic-related decor). Great drinks, good food, and dog friendly. Also a great place to go if you have kids in tow.

Bircus Brewing/North South Baking: Excellent wood-fired pizza – and Wed.-Sunday mornings, at the same location is the incredible North South Bakery. (If you’re in a class here, you’ll almost certainly get to try their baked goods.)

Inspirado: Eclectic menu. Osso buco and street tacos? Yes please. A very friendly place – lunch, dinner and brunch.

Zola: A bar and grill with inexpensive (but excellent) burgers and other pub food. (Note: You may encounter smokers here.)

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Pork ho fun at Kung Food.

Amerasia Kung Food: Don’t be fooled by the appearance of this divey-looking Chinese place. People come from all over the city for lunch and dinner. It also has one of the best selections of beer in the city. If you like noodles, get the pork ho fun (and ask them to make it a little extra crispy).

Riverside Korean: Authentic Korean. A karaoke room (yes, we’ve done it). Riverside never disappoints.

House of Grill: Tasty Persian food served up by the friendliest family in the restaurant business.

ChiMaek: Chicken and beer – both delicious. (Get the flight of dipping sauces with the chicken.)

Keystone Grill: Family-friendly place for lunch, dinner or brunch. The mac and cheese varieties are great.

The Gruff: A pizza place in the shadow of the Roebling bridge. Fantastic pizzas (try the Italian meat pizza or the Margarita) plus local craft beer and one of the most inspiring views in the city.

Wunderbar: Excellent burgers, and mostly German-inspired food. (And French … the brie and bacon sandwich is delish).

Whew, Now Cincinnati
I’m going to keep this brief. This blog entry is turning into an opus already. All of these restaurants are less than a mile from the river. I’m also skipping places that are so popular (The Eagle, Bakersfield, Taft Ale House) that you can’t easily get in.

Sotto: The best restaurant in the city. Period. The first time my daughter tried the short rib cappellacci she cried. No lie.

Boca: The big brother to Sotto. A bit fancy, but unforgettable in every respect.

Gomez salsa. Take-out only, from a walk-up window. Try the “Turtle Bowl.”

Maplewood: The best breakfast in the city. No question.

Taglio: Crave-worthy Detroit-style pizza.

Mita’s: Beautiful Spanish restaurant with achingly good paella.

Nada: Upscale Mexican with a fantastic brunch.

Krueger’s Tavern: Delicious hamburgers and homemade sausage.

Taste of Belgium: Fried chicken and waffles. Great breakfast. Belgian ale on tap.

Morelein Lager House: A local brewery with a restaurant – the view of the Roebling Bridge and Covington alone is worth the trip.

Salazar: I vacillate between Salazar and Sotto as my favorite places in the city.

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Pulled pork sandwich at Eli’s.

Findlay Market & Eli’s: A old open-air market and the pride of Cincinnati. On weekends we walk around, eat whatever smells good and buy sausages (Kroeger meat) for the week. Eli’s is adjacent and it’s my favorite barbecue joint.

Entertain Your Family
The Newport Aquarium is a short walk from downtown. The Fire Museum is awesome if you have kids who like fire trucks. If your kids are a little older (8 to 10), try the Contemporary Arts Center (CAC). Start at the top floor where they have a wild area for kids to create art. We’ve spent days there. Plus the contemporary art throughout is top shelf. And the Zaha Hadid-designed building is fantastic to explore.

If it’s nice outside, go down to the riverfront on the Cincinnati side to the Smale Riverfront Park to blow off steam and ride the merry-go-round. Plus there are a ton of places to eat there at The Banks.

The ace in the hole for entertaining the kiddos is the Cincinnati Museum Center. You can spend two or three days solid here without boring the kids (or yourself). The Children’s Museum is there, plus the History Museum, an IMAX theater, the Natural History Museum, an ice cream parlor and all the old train station stuff that kids love. We lived there every weekend when our kids were young.

The Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden is world renowned for some of its breeding programs (and for Fiona the hippo) – but odds are decent the kids will be most taken with World of the Insect. Shudder.

If your kids like art, head up to Mt. Adams (one of the hills 5 minutes from downtown) for the Cincinnati Art Museum. They have kids programs, including a dedicated space for kids to run wild, art style. Check it out here. And the museum features free admission.

All the above places can be visited easily with public transportation.

More Classes at the Lost Art Press Storefront

Posted on by Lost Art Press

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Megan Fitzpatrick and Brendan Gaffney have opened up some new classes that will be taught in the Lost Art Press storefront in 2018.

All three of us have been busy getting the store and shop ready. We now have six high-quality workbenches in the front room of the storefront, which is filled with natural light. And the mechanical library, Horse Garage and biergarten are coming along nicely as well. All in all, it will be an excellent place to learn handwork.

Here are the details on the classes:

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Build a Dutch Tool Chest with Megan Fitzpatrick
Feb. 17-18, 2018
Cost: $300 plus a materials fee. To register, click here.

During this intense two-day class you’ll build a Dutch tool chest from pine using dovetails, dados, rabbets and nails. Because of the demands of the project, this class will likely run into the early evening to ensure everyone will complete their chest. The Dutch chest is an excellent introduction to handwork and the result is a fine place to store your tools.

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Build the Cabinetmaker’s Sector with Brendan Gaffney
June 2-3, 2018
Cost: $300, which includes all raw materials. This second class is already full with people who signed up for the first class. We’ll be opening a wait list soon.

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.
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Build a Shaker Silverware Tray with Megan Fitzpatrick
June 23-24, 2018
Cost: $250, plus a small materials fee for wood & cut brads (likely around $30). To register, click here.

Make a classic Shaker silverware tray in this introduction to hand-cut dovetails. In this two-day class, you’ll learn:

  • Dovetail layout using dividers
  • How to use a backsaw to saw to a line
  • How to wield a coping or fret saw
  • How to pare and chop to a line with a chisel
  • Several strategies for transferring the tails to the pin board
  • Techniques for fitting the joint
  • Why dovetails work – and we’ll look at some examples of long-lasting period dovetails that look as if they were gnawed out by a beaver – “perfection” is overrated when it comes to the efficacy of this joint. (That said, you’ll also learn some “tricks” for fixing less-than-stellar dovetails.)
  • How to lay out then cut and fair the handles (both the hand holds and the curved top edge)
  • How to smooth-plane your surfaces
  • How to use cut nails (to secure the bottom board)
  • And of course, how to put it all together (and why I recommend liquid hide glue).

— Christopher Schwarz

A Review of ‘Carving the Acanthus Leaf’ by Mary May

Posted on by Kara Uhl

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When I first stepped into one of Mary May’s architectural woodcarving classes, I had some vague notion of what it would be like to carve wood. Though I had some interest (I’m interested in making just about anything with wood), woodcarving had never ranked high on my list of interesting avocations, much less passionate ones. But after two days of her instruction, I walked away with an entirely different appreciation for woodcarving and for what Mary had to offer.

As readers of her book, “Carving the Acanthus Leaf,” will quickly find out, Mary is not simply a person who happens to carve wood for a living; she is a woodcarving master par excellence, a truly gifted soul whose work is an expression of some deep passion, driven by faith, and guided by years of diligent apprenticeship and experience.

To most of us, acanthus leaf carvings are a familiar albeit barely understood adornment to historic architectural woodwork. We’ve seen them in the mighty cathedrals of the European Renaissance and in grand public buildings of the 18th and 19th centuries. We’ve probably even seen them on ornate pieces of Chippendale cabinetry. But what Mary May shows us through her book is the robust history of the acanthus leaf from its early Egyptian beginnings through its history in Grecian, Roman and Byzantine architecture; its influence on (though absence from) Viking woodcarvings; its rich revival during the Renaissance; and, ultimately, its decline in the 20th century “machine age.”

As with many aspects of traditional craftsmanship, acanthus leaf carvings have enjoyed a renewal of interest in recent years, perhaps as we humans struggle to maintain our identity amidst an increasingly technological ubiquity. To that end, Mary has offered a gem.

While the book can be through of as nothing less than a how-to guide for woodcarvers, it is much more than that. Steeped in detailed instruction on carving numerous styles of acanthus leaves, Mary’s book weaves the reader through a complex array of history and tradition, of love and romance, and of skill and passion for the art form. This is a uniquely personal text through which the author walks the reader through her own history with woodcarving as a means of inspiring others to take the leap into what may prove to be a highly rewarding journey toward mastery of a new skill. Relating her friendship with Bill Cox, who, at 89 years of age, took up woodcarving and served as her shop helper for six years, Mary encourages others to take up the craft. And, by relating some of her own mistakes along the way, Mary reminds us that we are all human, including the masters.

If you have ever looked at ornate woodcarvings and found yourself at awe of the skill it took to produce them, buy this book. Read it. Get some tools, pick up a piece of basswood, and start carving. You won’t soon regret the experience.

– Michael A. Knox

‘Handplane Essentials’ Now Available in French

Posted on by Lost Art Press

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Thanks to the tireless work of woodworker Yann Facchin, my book “Handplane Essentials” has been translated into French and is now available for sale. You can read about the book and order it through the publisher’s website here.

I recently received a copy of the book and am impressed that the publisher took pains to manufacture the book on high-quality paper. The book block is sewn (like our books at Lost Art Press). And the binding job is first-rate. And, as a bonus, the book is printed in France.

(I am mentioning the great job that Editions du Vieux Chene did with this book to also shame the overseas publishers that have been printing my F+W books on glorified newsprint. Apologies, but I have zero control over that.)

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The French translation of “Handplane Essentials” is of the revised edition of the book, so it has all the information in the current English version, which is available here.

Thanks to Yann and the French publisher for doing such a fine job.

— Christopher Schwarz

Richard Jones: My Approach to Writing About Timber Technology

Posted on by Kara Uhl

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Editor’s Note: This is the third in a series of blog posts by Richard Jones, who has written a detailed book about timber technology that required hundreds of hours of research, which he talks about here. The book is scheduled to be released in early 2018.

— Kara Gebhart Uhl

My tentative foray into writing articles on timber technology for magazine and journal publication morphed almost seamlessly into writing a book (which you can read about here). I felt the material was unsuitable for the compressed format expected by woodworking magazine editors. Short, snappy articles of 2,500 to 3,500 words incorporating 10 or so images are favoured. The generally small remuneration for significant writing effort was off-putting, and occasional, irritating editorial blunders made by the magazines niggled: How, for example, could a couple of sentences from one paragraph be moved into another paragraph on another page? It turned the article I’d spent a great deal of time perfecting into verbal flatulence, and rather diminished the end product.

I wanted to create something that differentiated itself from other books on timber technology. I asked myself questions such as: “As a woodworker, what’s important to know?” and “Are there issues secondary to the core material that gives a woodworker important and useful ‘rounding out’ knowledge?” By this time in 2007 I’d moved to a new job leading the undergraduate Furniture Making programme at Leeds College of Art (LCA, now Leeds Arts University). LCA required I develop a ‘research profile’ befitting a lecturer in the UK Higher Education sector. I had a project in hand that I could use to undertake appropriate ‘academic research and publishing’. I had the kernel of a manuscript suited for such a purpose where light Harvard Referencing would be appropriate.

My starting point was to write what I knew, but to verify the information. It quickly became apparent that what I ‘knew’ was a mixture of truth, along with myth and hearsay that had been passed down through generations of woodworkers to me. I needed to research a topic through studying several reliable sources of information, collate, assess, draw conclusions, and then write. Sources were books, journals, online publications, personal discussions and correspondence with specialists in their field, all with verifiable credentials, e.g., wood scientists, entomologists, mycologists, engineers, etc, and further, to persuade experts to peer review relevant sections of my manuscript. Being in an academic field at the time of writing had its advantages. There’s a common etiquette in academia of peer reviewing the work of fellow academics – I was in the fortunate position of being able to take advantage of this arrangement.

– Richard Jones