One of the curious frustrations in researching “Ingenious Mechanicks” was reading the reports from archaeologists who speculated on how woodworking tools were used or objects were made. It became obvious that some of these guys didn’t know the difference between a dovetail and a mortise. And hadn’t ever cut one.
Not all archeologists are like this.
Check out this fantastic article from the Archaeology.org site about the joinery in a 7,000-year-old well. Not only do they do normal stuff in the lab, but they try to remake the well with tools available at the time. And start with the tree.
“You have to handle things. By using stone tools ourselves, we can see what works and what doesn’t work,” says archaeologist Rengert Elburg. “Because from your writing desk you can’t say anything.”
I put it a bit more crudely in “Ingenious Mechanicks:”
“It’s not fair to our early ancestors to put words in their mouths. We don’t know how dry their wood was when they started to build their workbenches. Was it fresh from the tree? Dried for 20 years? Something in between?
“We can guess, which is what most people do. Or we can build a bunch of workbenches from woods in varying degrees of wetness and observe the results through several years. This second path is much more difficult than sitting naked in the dark at your computer keyboard – fingers covered in the dust of Cheetos – and pontificating online. But it’s the path I took.”
So Roubo could not very well do a comprehensive book on furniture making without including some mention of how to prepare frames for upholstery, and yet in his opening line he gives a real clue as to his general feelings about the matter. He says, “…seats in general are finished with fabric or caning…where the former is the most utilized and totally the province of the upholsterer.” It is not difficult to imagine Roubo arguing with an irate upholsterer over the details of a frame, just the way that modern upholsterers complain about the placement of tacking rails, and in the end just let the upholsterer figure out how to complete the chair. Roubo is clear on how to prepare loose or “slip” seats, those that are removable from the chair, but when he discusses how upholstery materials are permanently attached, it was just not so.
Figures 7, 8 & 9 from Plate 227
In Plate 227 Roubo provides three figures in profile of the attachment of webbing to massive carved frames, these are figures 7, 8 & 9. Upon first seeing this plate, my reaction was simply, “Impossible!” But knowing Roubo’s meticulous drawing skill and thorough work, there had to be an answer.
Figure 8 clearly shows (from left) the webbing attached to the side of the rail, tacked near the top, a next layer of under upholstery (muslin) tacked below that, and finally a show cover attached with decorative tacks right at the top of the decorative moulding. As a student of the English tradition of upholstery, this was unfamiliar to me, as the English securely tack the webbing to the top of the frame (as shown in Figure 7) and thereby have good access to stretch or “strain” it tight. So then why is Roubo showing the webbing in Figure 8 this way? I put this question to everyone I thought could help until I was fortunate to meet the gifted, classically trained and very French master upholsterer Bruno Paulin-Lopez. Interestingly, Roubo, was not required reading for his training, though he was familiar with the well-known and contemporary book on the trades by Denis Diderot, and another massive text called Tapisseire D’Ameublement by Claude Ossut (not translated into English), both of which explain in quite some detail how to web a chair frame.
First and foremost, the French tradition of webbing requires the webs to be placed tight, side by side with no gaps, unlike the English, which employs an open weave pattern, and this is critical to understanding what Roubo is portraying. And secondly, this type of un-sprung upholstery (chair, ottoman, chaise, etc.) would have a considerable, in some cases massive, pillow on top of the webbed “deck.” Finally, Roubo, seemingly aware that he is not being clear, gives us some information in a long footnote. To paraphrase, “…most upholsterers feel that the webbing should be on the side, while others are convinced that it could be on the top of the frame, which would make it very firm.”
With Bruno’s guidance, I have come to believe that the “most upholsterers” Roubo consulted were the older generation who grew up tacking everything on the side of the rails and whom Roubo did not dare slight in his representation of how this should be done. And the “others” are those talented pioneers desperately trying to make sure their upholstery methods could keep up with the fast-changing furniture styles of the opulent French court, such as the elegant gentleman craftsman portrayed by Diderot.
The following is a recreation to scale of Figure 8 and shows an interpretation of how the webbing would have been placed unfolded on the rabbeted edge, followed by a muslin layer tacked slightly above, and finally the show cover tacked right at the edge with decorative tacks. Because the webbing is side by side, there is a smooth surface for the succeeding layers, and because the piece is un-sprung it would not be necessary to stretch the webbing as tightly, and would actually give the bottom of the pillow a place to nestle.
The webbing shown here and in the next image is a modern reproduction, for illustration purposes only.
The next recreation uses the same frame pattern and shows a more “modern” approach with webbing folded under, tacked on top of the rail, followed by a layer of linen hessian tacked on a beveled edge to save the space on the front of the rail for the tacking of the show cover. This technique is similar to the English style.
The final recreation shows a full hand-sewn foundation using a coarse “first stuffing” material, which is drawn by careful stitching to form a firm seat and a rolled edge. This technique evolved in both the French and English traditions, and creates a custom, extremely durable base for a softer second stuffing and made possible the upholstery of many complex furniture designs.
I feel confident in saying that Roubo would be truly pleased to know that the techniques he illustrated as well as their many variations are still practiced by the finest upholsterers working today. — Michael Mascelli
“As an instructional text, it probably has more process images than any other book on carving that I own,” O’Brien writes. ” … I can’t imagine more instructional detail being provided. If the book were composed of pictures alone, it would be worth the cost.”
O’Brien, a skilled carver himself (check out his letter carving here), writes that carving is one of the more elusive areas of the craft. “While it is disguised as woodworking, it really has more in common with drawing,” he says. “Realizing this took me a long time. The skills required for executing a carving with curves and flowing lines come from a different part of the brain than the skills we use for the predictable hard and straight lines of milling lumber and cutting joints. Think of the chisel as a drawing tool, not a cutting tool. Mary provides ample instruction on how to design, draw, and lay out the acanthus leaf and explains that this is important, not only for the task at hand, but also in order to develop our ability to see and execute fine details.”
O’Brien talks about the Eureka moment he had while reading Mary’s section on sharpening, the importance of storytelling when discussing technique (and how Mary’s memorable tales enhance the book) and, well, the fact that the book is a steal.
“The amount of time and labor evident in the making of this book belie the comparably low cost ($49 or less for the PDF version). It’s hard to imagine creating this much text and countless images in such a superbly designed, printed, and bound edition – in the United States no less!”
I’m in Charleston, S.C., this week to inventory my father’s belongings and start figuring out what to do with his possessions and his house. I also have one important personal task: retrieve a workbench I loaned him many years ago so I can restore it.
I made the bench in 2002 or 2003 for Popular Woodworking (you can see it here), and it stayed in the shop until I loaned it to dad in 2009. Like many of my early benches, it’s made with yellow pine and Veritas bench bolts – still a great combination that I recommend for bench builders. These days, however, most of my customers prefer giant oak slabs.
After my bench moved south, it endured multiple hurricanes and tropical depressions, including Bonnie, Matthew and Irma. My dad’s house is in a low-lying area with the shop on the ground floor, so there were a couple times my bench was afloat during storm surges.
Today I took it apart. This process should take 10 minutes. But everything – everything – was rusted, jammed and degraded. Wood screws that should have accepted a Phillips head were rusted to the point where nothing would unscrew them (except a hacksaw). The metal drawer slides were about 50 percent rust and required lots of persuasion to expectorate their drawers.
But the wood was in surprisingly good condition. The laminated top hadn’t split. The Veritas Twin Screws still turned (despite heavy rusting) and even the plywood edge tape on the drawer cabinet was in perfect condition.
Tomorrow the bench begins its journey back north, where I will clean it, replace the rusted parts and true up the benchtop. It’s going back to work. And I hope the that worst weather it will ever see is a Midwestern thunderstorm.
My daughter Katy made a huge batch of soft wax during spring break, and you can order it from her etsy.com store here.
This is a 100-percent teenager enterprise. She makes it from scratch in my shop, cans it, labels it and ships it out. Then she spends the money on rock music and chicken nuggets (I hope).
