(Publisher’s note: We try to kindly discourage readers from giving us gifts. We have all the tools we need. And there are so many other people in the world who need help. But once in a very great while something shows up that is so stunning that we feel compelled to share. — CS)
When we get an unexpected package at Lost Art Press from the other side of the world, it’s typically a book proposal – but once in a while, we are stunned by the kindness of strangers. The hand-cut marquetry bookmarks shown above, by Elena Simonova (@woodsimka on Instagram), are just such a surprise. They were commissioned by Russian reader Alexandr (no last name in his accompanying letter), and feature Bean the Shop Cat as drawn by Katherine Schwarz for a LAP sticker a few years back, the Lost Art Press dividers and stylized lettering, and a six-stick Kentucky stick chair a la Christopher Schwarz.
Even before we realized the pictures are hand-cut marquetry, we were impressed by the scrollsaw pattern work on the lower portion of the bookmarks. Then we took a close look at the tops:
That is some tiny and impressive work!
Thank you, Alexandr (and BTW, your English is impeccable despite your concern to the contrary), and thank you Elena; we will treasure and use these gorgeous and generous gifts.
We have so many things coming down the birth canal this month that we should install stoplights?
Next week we will release our embroidered SuperWoobie™* on the world. This is our favorite microfiber cloth embroidered (here in Covington) with “Don’t Despair – Nothing Without Labour” on one corner. It’s a small, encouraging reminder you’ll see every time you wipe down your tools after a good (or off-the-rails) day in the shop.
I expect these to be $23 or $24 retail. They’ll come with instructions and a small zippered bag that makes soaking the rag with oil a simple task.
After that, look for the Lost Art Press Full-zip Hoodie. Tom Bonamici investigated what it would take to sew and stitch a hoodie, and then we compared the price and quality to the American Giant zip hoodies, which are the best ones that I know of on the market today. We decided to use American Giant as our supplier because we couldn’t beat the price or quality.
I have worn these hoodies for years and can vouch for their comfort, fit and durability. Ours will be printed with the “Nothing Without Labour” logo on the back with a bee printed on the front. I don’t have a retail price calculated, yet.
After that, the Crucible Dovetail Template is coming. This is a solid steel template based off the Woodjoy Tools one that is no longer made (yes, we are paying the designer a royalty on every tool sold). This is Megan Fitzpatrick’s favorite dovetail marker and has slopes for 1:6 and 1:8 dovetails.
Unlike the original, ours is milled out of one piece of solid steel, which reduces assembly time for us and ensures a perfect 90° at the corner. The price will be less than $50. In time I hope we will come out with a marker that also has 1:4, which is the redneck dovetail slope I prefer.
And after that, our beautiful edition of Joseph Moxon’s “Mechanick Exercises or the Doctrine of Handy-Works” will arrive. This important early woodworking book deserves to be in print at a price everyone can afford (about $25 for a clothbound book with sewn signatures). Plus every book sold will help benefit the Early American Industries Association, which assisted with book production.
— Christopher Schwarz
*We didn’t really trademark SuperWoobie™, ChairChat™ or 38” Workbench™. I just finally learned to make a trademark symbol on the keyboard and am enjoying it.
In the summer of 1997, Drew Langsner held a Chairmakers’ Symposium at Country Workshops with John Brown and Dave Sawyer in between classes from the two chairmaking legends. (JB had just wrapped up a Welsh stick chair class and Dave was about to teach an advanced Windsor chair class).
The gathering was captured on video by Grant Libramento, and Drew generously loaned the VHS tapes to us to see if we could do anything with them so the video could be shared with the chairmaking world. We had them digitized (at one of those “preserve your past” commercial places), but I don’t know if some of the quality was lost in translation, or if the originally tech wasn’t great, or if I chose poorly when I sent the videos off for digitizing. I just don’t know. There’s a clip below to give you an idea of the challenge.
So, we’re hoping one of you has mad video/audio enhancement skills, and might like to tackle this wee project. Maybe the video can be enhanced but the best audio solution is to create a transcript/running text crawl? Maybe it can also be condensed into a highlight reel (there are about 12-1/2 hours of footage)? This would be volunteer work (though I suspect some LAP swag might come your way) and we’d then share it for free, too.
I get asked (a lot) why there are so few stick chairs in the furniture record of the United States.
To that question, I reply, “Just you wait.”
Ever since I built my first stick chair in 2003, my aim has not been to reproduce the chairs I adore from Wales, Scotland, Ireland and Sweden. Instead, my goal has been to do what Americans have long done with furniture forms and other cultural movements: Adapt them to this continent and its people.
Black Americans took an African call-and-response form of music and made the blues (then rock ‘n’ roll). Rural Americans – black and white – melded African and Spanish instruments (the banjo and guitar), with spirituals and traditional British songs to make “hillbilly music” and “race music” – what we now call country music and rhythm and blues.
All cultures adopt and adapt elements from “away,” but Americans seem particularly prone to it. We even export our adaptations back across the oceans. In Naples, Italy, anyone can buy pizza topped with hot dog chunks and french fries.
Now before you start calling me “Jingo” Schwarz, know that I don’t think everything Americans do is good. Not even close. We took the éclair and made Twinkies. The baguette became Wonder Bread. It’s a mixed bag of vanilla soft serve and Vanilla Ice.
English secretary, 1810.
Wait, Isn’t This a Woodworking Blog?
In the world of furniture, American designers and woodworkers tended to simplify forms brought over from Great Britain, the European continent and elsewhere. To be clear, there were American woodworkers who equaled the ornamentation and excess of their counterparts across the Atlantic. But in general, American interpretations removed ornament, simplified overall forms and relied more heavily on the solid timber that was the greatest resource of this continent.
English secretary, 1805.
A long day’s walk down King Street in Charleston, S.C., lays out this story that played out in the 18th and 19th centuries. King Street is awash in antiques stores that specialize in British and European antiques. And there are other stores that specialize in American antiques – plus all the house museums that are stuffed with American and imported furniture.
This long stroll (it will take you all day) also shows what the market has decided, whether you agree with it or not. My father would buy English chests of drawers on King Street in the 1990s for $1,200. The American ones were entirely out of his financial reach.
American chest of drawers, turn of the 19th century.
Virginia bookcase, late 18th century.
Finally, to Chair Stuff
British Forest Chairs (aka Windsors) also faced the same story. American forms are – in general – simpler. Simpler turnings. No backsplat. Fewer carved elements. (I must add, however, that my favorite Forest chair of all time is British.)
Yorkshire Windsors, early 19th century.
Massachusetts Windsors, early 19th century.
When it comes to stick chairs, my goal has always been to Americanize them. (I’ve built only a couple close copies of antique Welsh chairs – mostly to prove I could do it.) What does this Americanization entail?
First, I have changed my designs to reflect the wood we have here. Unlike Wales, we have enormous stands of straight timber. The curved stuff – which the Welsh use for arms and combs – exists here, but it’s more difficult to find. During my two visits to Wales, a walk among the hedgerows revealed a dozens of bent armbows. So my arms are different. They’re built differently, and you will see further changes in future designs.
One of the hundreds of Welsh chairs that are among my “favorites” and influence my designs.
I also tend to favor crisp lines over curved ones. All beautiful and well-worn antiques suffer “erosion,” for lack of a better word. But I try to take that crispness or clarity a little further. I avoid rounded and pillowed profiles for the most part. I like facets. I don’t like turned, round or bulbous components.
I also tend to favor geometry that is more dramatic. Many Welsh chairs had dramatic rake and splay. But a lot of them had little rake or splay. Many had sticks that were dead-vertical. I try to take the dramatic bits and pieces from old chairs and combine them into something else. I won’t say it’s new, as there is no such thing.
I also like color and grain. I am happy to paint my chairs a vibrant color or use an oil and beeswax finish on them. I am dead certain that many old chairs got flashy paint jobs back in the day or a finish that was mostly soot and smoke from the hearth. So my finish choices stand in contrast to what the old chairs look like today.
Why am I telling you this? Well, in some small way, I know that the Welsh get irritated when someone builds one of my chair designs and calls it a “Welsh Stick Chair” on Instagram or Facebook. In truth, they are building an American Stick Chair designed by a guy who dreams of Welsh, Scottish and Irish chairs all the time. So if you want to avoid a Welsh invasion of Kentucky, I recommend you call your stuff what it is: American.
Also, I want to start a conversation about this form and what it could become. I hope that other American makers will look at 11,564 old chairs and see different details that could make up a vocabulary for American stick chairs. Because there isn’t an “American Stick Chair” yet, there is enormous opportunity to explore this idea and contribute to something that just might have some legs.
— Christopher Schwarz
Hands down, my favorite Forest Chair of all time. A lovely early example of the form.
I hope I don’t get in trouble for stealing this screenshot.
Woodworker, writer, whisky-lover, actor and all-around renaissance man Nick Offerman has a new twice-a-week Substack newsletter, “Donkey Thoughts,” in which he hopes, he writes, to be sometimes useful and “at least relatively amusing.” Having read (nay, devoured) all of Nick’s books; I have no doubt he will succeed on both fronts.
I couldn’t hit “subscribe” fast enough. Because yes, as long as Nick is the “slow-talking…medium-looking white guy in his fifties try to find his figurative ass with both hands,” I very much look forward to reading about it. The text version will be free, he writes, “but if you want to be able to ask questions or see the bonus materials, which may or may not include some minor nudity, or eventually imbibe the scents(!), you’ll need to subscribe. It’s extortion, yes, but at least I’m up front about it.”
