Lost Art Press

Storefront Open This Saturday (Without Me)

Posted on by Lost Art Press
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Brendan helps install original copperplate engravings from “The Anarchist’s Design” book in our bench room.

Megan Fitzpatrick and Brendan Gaffney will staff the Lost Art Press storefront this Saturday so I can have a weekend with my wife (it’s our 25th anniversary).

There have been lots of changes at the storefront, 837 Willard St. in Covington, Ky., since last month. The Electric Horse Garage will be up and running (the new roof goes on starting Tuesday). Plus, we are setting up the bench room for classes that Brendan, Megan and Will Myers will be teaching there this year.

We now have nine (!) different workbenches at the storefront for you to examine.

  • My French oak Roubo bench
  • The Holtzapffel workbench
  • A Nicholson bench with angled legs
  • Megan Fitzpatrick’s “Glue-bo” bench made with laminated beams
  • A nice commercial Ulmia
  • A cherry and cottonwood Roubo bench
  • The Loffelholz 1505 workbench
  • The Saalburg Roman bench
  • The Herculaneum eight-legged bench

So if you are in the market for a workbench design, our storefront might be a good place to investigate.

As per usual, we will be selling our full line of Lost Art Press books, plus T-shirts. We are, however, quite low on blemished books right now.

The storefront is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on the second Saturday of each month. Directions and a map are here. Our next open day will be Feb. 10 (I’ll be there!).

— Christopher Schwarz

Shop Safety: This Tip Could Save Your Life

Posted on by fitz

… or “I never said I wanted to go surfing.”

Every so often something reminds you that serious injury is only a heartbeat away.

I had one of those experiences yesterday in the shop. The culprit: a scrap of plywood — well, that and a moment’s inattention as I walked across the floor after answering a phone call.

I’d been using the plywood scrap, an offcut of the prefinished maple I use for kitchen cabinet carcases, as a spacer to hold drawer slides at the requisite height while I screwed them in place. I had my camera and tripod set up nearby, to document the process for the book about kitchens that I’m working on for Lost Art Press. After installing the slides, I took the spacer out of the cabinet and set it on the floor without another thought.

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The offending piece of scrap (here with finished side up), with Joey for scale.
As I crossed the floor to return to work I inadvertently stepped on the piece of plywood, which happened to be lying with the finished side down. I might as well have stepped onto a sheet of ice. It was one of those slow-motion moments as my mind assessed the likely result: “My head is probably going to hit this concrete floor.” Fortunately, while my mind was analyzing the situation my body was taking action. I felt my torso jerk up and around,  saving me from the fall.

But ouch: a sharp stab from left hip to right shoulder. No concussion, thankfully, but hello, my old friend Muscle Spasm. It’s off to the chiropractor Monday morning.

Lesson learned: Never leave prefinished plywood on the floor, especially with the shiny side down.–Nancy Hiller, author of Making Things Work

My Willow Phase

Posted on by Lost Art Press

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The unpleasant funny thing about visiting your family during the holidays is encountering your former woodworking self.

I’m in Charleston, S.C., with my dad this week and encountered my Late Willow Phase, a time during the 1990s when I was obsessed with rustic furniture. I had honestly forgotten about this phase (unlike my leather trousers phase).

For a couple years I drove around in my Volvo 240DL station wagon cutting willow switches out of ditches on the Westside of Cincinnati. I stored all these sticks in buckets in my shop, giving it an arboreal look. Using a drill and a tenon cutter, I made dozens of chairs, trellises, frames, anything you could fashion with sticks and tenons. It was my first pleasant encounter with bending green wood.

One Christmas we planned to visit my father in Arkansas. Lucy and I were broke, and my dad already owns everything he needs. So I took an afternoon to make this little footstool for him from a scrap of white pine and discarded willow switches from a chair project.

And here it sits today (I took it out on his porch for a photo). And for something that I threw together in a day, it’s not half-bad.

Phases can fade away or end abruptly. This one had its throat slit. One day I got a letter from a family that makes willow furniture with a bunch of photos of their beautiful pieces. The letter said: “We’ve seen your stuff. It sucks. This is what willow stuff should look like. Please quit.”

I did.

— Christopher Schwarz

What is a ‘Loose Tenon?’

Posted on by Lost Art Press

Loose tenon disassembled

Some readers seemed confused by my description of assembling a benchtop with the help of a “loose tenon.”

The expression doesn’t mean that the tenon rattles loose in the mortise. Rather it means that the tenon is not integral to either piece being joined. It is like a Domino or a biscuit. It enters mortises in both pieces.

I drew up two illustrations to show how this works. The drawing at the top illustrates the joint when it is apart. The loose tenon is shown floating between the two components of the benchtop.

Loose tenon ASSEMBLED

The second illustration is an “X-ray” view of the assembled joint with 1/2”-diameter pegs piercing the benchtop pieces and the loose tenon.

“Loose tenons” have many other names, including “slip tenons” or “floating tenons.” All these terms are accepted in woodworking journalism.

Hope this helps.

— Christopher Schwarz

Loose Tenons & Workbench Tops

Posted on by Lost Art Press

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We think of loose tenons as a modern joint, but it is far from it. Early Greek and Roman boats were made with loose tenons that were pegged to keep the hulls together.

I’ve always been fascinated by the fact that Richard Maguire also used this same technology to glue up his benchtops (read all about that here). I’ll be honest, I’ve always relied on glue alone (when I didn’t have a monumental one-piece slab top).

But my view changed a couple years ago when we got a bad batch of epoxy and several benchtops delaminated. If I ever have to glue up a slab benchtop again, I’m adding loose tenons.

Interestingly, Maguire doesn’t drawbore the loose tenons in his tops. He states: “a draw bored peg here would have been much weaker than this straight through approach.” I do believe I will be experimenting with this joint – both drawbored and not – to see for myself.=

Maguire wasn’t the first to come up with the idea of loose tenons in a benchtop (though I heard it from him first). Recently I got to inspect an early 20th-century French workbench from La Forge Royale that used the technology.

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This commercial workbench was surprisingly rough in manufacture. Joints were deliberately overcut throughout to make the bench easy to assemble. The “breadboard” ends were merely nailed or screwed on. No tongue. I could go on and on. It’s still a great workbench (and still standing after 100 years), so I’m not knocking it. But I was surprised.

Despite the rough construction, the builders took the extra time to add loose tenons in the benchtop’s joint. That fact says a lot to me as to how important a detail they thought it was.

So it’s worth a thought for your next workbench.

— Christopher Schwarz, editor, Lost Art Press
Personal site: christophermschwarz.com