Lost Art Press

On Forcing Yourself

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If it weren’t for my wife, Lucy, I’d probably live and work alone – without a phone and with as little direct human contact as possible.

Yup, Lucy had to ask me out on our first date. And yes, she had to ask for my hand in marriage.

During the last 20 years, I’ve tried to pretend to be more social. Why? Because it has helped my woodworking immensely.

As I’ve mentioned before, all of my ideas for books were the result of talking to other woodworkers about their tools, their workbenches and they way they work. And all the best things I have learned about the craft have come from watching other woodworkers build things – not a DVD, not on a computer screen but in their shop and in real time.

I was reminded of this last night while installing hardware on this Campaign Secretary. I’d dusted off my plunge router to waste away a bunch of wood for a piece of brass in a prominent place on the secretary. Everything was going great until my hand slipped and the bit flew into a place it wasn’t supposed to. In about a second, I had made a dime-sized major error on one of the most visible surfaces of this piece.

I unplugged the router, carefully wrapped the cord around it and returned it to the bottom of a drawer for another two-year shunning. Dang I hate those spinny tools.

Now, how to fix the error? The answer was easy, thanks to my friendship with Carl Bilderback. Carl is a semi-retired carpenter, tool collector, woodworker and all-around generous fellow. We first met when he called to give me some grief about an error in one of my tool reviews. Despite the fact that he was ripping me a new one, he was gentle about it. And he became an excellent resource for me on hand work and an occasional author for Popular Woodworking Magazine.

Carl had written a piece on how to make a “dutchman” – a patch used to disguise an error such as this. Patching other people’s mistakes was one of his specialties as a carpenter. The article, “Perfect Patching,” is in the February 2008 issue on page 76 if you’d like to read it. I took the photos for the article and was his editor.

It’s a brilliant article, and Carl’s knowledge and willingness to share it really saved my butt. In about 15 minutes I had glued in a patch. Then I went to dinner with a fellow woodworker where I confessed my crimes (“Forgive me Norm, for I have sinned”). When I came home I leveled the patch and went back to work – this time removing waste with a firmer gouge instead of a router. Thanks Carl.

So where exactly is the repair? I’m not telling. It’s my job to hide it. It’s your job to find it.

— Christopher Schwarz

Come See Lost Art Press at 2 Lie-Nielsen Hand Tool Events

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Lost Art Press will be exhibiting at two of the Lie-Nielsen Hand Tool events this spring: March 30-31 at the Popular Woodworking Magazine shop, and April 20-21 at Jeff Miller’s shop in Chicago.

Click here for show details.

We will have all of our books with us, of course, and perhaps a tool chest or two to show off. At the Cincinnati event I likely will bring along the finished Campaign Secretary I’ve been building – but that depends on how much hauling capacity we will have.

We attend these events every year because they are a fantastic and free way for people to get hand tool instruction and advice. There is no hard-sell by Lie-Nielsen whatsoever. They simply have all the tools out for you to use, and they offer instruction in how to sharpen, set-up and use them.

Lie-Nielsen also invites other toolmakers, publishers and instructors to exhibit at these events. Daed Toolworks will be at the event in Cincinnati, as will Glen-Drake Toolworks, Blue Spruce, Czeck Edge and Chuck Bender from Acanthus Workshop.

The Chicago event will feature Elkhead Tools, the boys from Benchcrafted, Glen-Drake and Daed Toolworks.

If you haven’t been to one of these events, I highly recommend you find one in your area and plan a day to just hang out and soak up the information. Ask Kevin Drake of Glen-Drake Tool Works to show you how he cuts dovetails (it’s cool). Ask Deneb Puchalski of Lie-Nielsen to show you how he uses toothed blades to prep stock (also cool). Then try the tools out yourself.

We hope to see you at one of these shows.

— Christopher Schwarz

Second Printing of ‘The Joiner & Cabinet Maker’

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We are just about to run out of copies of “The Joiner & Cabinet Maker” and are ordering a second printing. We have compliled a list of typographical errors that we want to correct in the second printing. If you have found any grammatical or factual errors, please send them to chris@lostartpress.com, and you will have my gratitude.

The other news on “The Joiner & Cabinet Maker” is that we hope to issue an audiobook of the original text of the fictional tale of young Thomas and bumbling Sam. This would be offered as a download for $8 (or so) or an audiobook CD for $12.

I first got the idea to do the audiobook from Roy Underhill. He suggested doing the book as a short film and casting Megan Fitzpatrick as the love interest for Thomas. Wait, I don’t remember Sally being Thomas’s love interest.

Anyway, after Roy’s suggestion, I was approached by a reader who asked if he could record the book on tape for a class of autistic children. He thought the tale and the associated handwork to build the packing box would be valuable to the students.

And that made me think that perhaps an audiobook might be fun for everyone.

Stay tuned.

— Christopher Schwarz

All the ‘Joint Stool’ Books are in the Mail

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It took seven days and seven nights, but I just dropped off the last of the pre-publication orders of “Make a Joint Stool from a Tree” at the U.S. Post Office.

We still have cleaning up to do – our sun room is full of packing detritus and there are still a few odd packages where things went wrong. But before tending to those tasks I decided to sit down the with book for a little bit. All in all, I’m fairly pleased.

I’ve received the following questions from readers about the book as a physical object. Here are the answers.

1. Why switch to a larger size? “Make a Joint Stool from a Tree” is 9” x 12”, which is considerably larger than the 6” x 9” we have been publishing since 2007. We decided to use the larger format because this book has more visual information than any of our other titles. And so we wanted to publish the photos and drawings as large as possible.

2. Why switch to color photos? As many of you know, I prefer black and white for my books. But other authors like color. Jennie Alexander and Peter Follansbee thought color would be best for this book. I agreed – especially after seeing the red stools.

3. Why a dust jacket and the plastic shrinkwrap? The dust jacket suits the large size of the book, and the shrinkwrap protects it during transit.

4. Why no glossy paper? With all the other changes, some readers expected us to switch to glossy, coated paper. Instead, I chose uncoated paper for several reasons. First, uncoated paper is more readable than glossy paper. I dislike the glare from glossy coated paper. (Yes, you can get coated paper with a matte finish, but what’s the point of that?) The second reason I chose uncoated stock is that it suits the subject matter. This is not a highbrow museum title – it’s about getting down to business with a hatchet. One last word on the paper: It wasn’t a cost decision. The price difference between coated and uncoated stock is inconsequential in my book.

Before I go, let me say just a couple more things about this book. First, I want to thank Peter and Jennie for taking a chance and letting Lost Art Press publish this book. Taunton Press would have been glad to publish this book. An academic press would have also pooed its ivory jodhpurs to get a book like this. It was an honor to work with both authors on this project, one of the highlights of my career in publishing.

Second, one of the reasons Jennie and Peter signed on with Lost Art Press is that we return a far, far greater share of profits to the authors. And the reason we can do that is because of the surprising, unflagging and (at times) almost embarrassing support of our customers. So thank you for all your support, economic and emotional. With the help of everyone who has purchased Lost Art Press stuff I was able to walk away from a great corporate job in June and not worry if my kids would be able to afford the koala ramen they love so well.

Mmmm. Koala ramen. It tastes like cough drops.

— Christopher Schwarz

‘Art of Joinery’ on Auction to Help The Wood Whisperer

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To help The Wood Whisperer defend his site against an ongoing DDoS attack, we are auctioning off copies of Lost Art Press’s first book, “The Art of Joinery,” which is out of print and is priced at $500 (ridiculously) on Amazon.

There are three uncirculated, mint copies in this auction. The top three bidders each win one copy. The bidding starts at $17, the original retail price of the book. To bid, leave a comment stating your bid. The auction ends at midnight Sunday, March 11, 2012.

We will ship these books anywhere, and 100 percent of your bid goes to Marc and Nicole Spagnuolo at The Wood Whisperer site – Lost Art Press will pick up the tab for shipping.

— Christopher Schwarz

Note: Tomorrow we auction off a copy of Charles Hummel’s “With Hammer in Hand,” the fantastic hard-to-find book about the Dominy workshop. The book on auction was donated by a reader of this blog.