Lost Art Press

‘Calvin Cobb’ Countdown – And a Free Excerpt

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CalvinCobb_Jacket6Barring some freak accident, Roy Underhill’s “Calvin Cobb: Radio Woodworker!” will begin shipping out to customers in one week.

At the same time, the book will be trucked and flown to our retailers. The following merchants have agreed to carry the book: Lee Valley Tools, Highland Woodworking, Tools for Working Wood and Classic Hand Tools in the UK.

International customers can also buy the downloadable version in the Lost Art Press store here.

To give you a small taste of Roy’s fiction writing, I’ve prepared an excerpt of Chapter 1 in pdf format. We might trot out a couple more chapters in the coming week and – if you are good – perhaps a dramatic reading by the man himself….

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Also, a quick reminder about shipping: We are offering free domestic shipping on this title until Nov. 29, when the shipping will be about $7. You can place your order here.

— Christopher Schwarz

Get To Know Mouldings With 3 Free Downloads

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Many woodworkers struggle when designing their own mouldings, and that’s because they haven’t studied enough of the most common forms. Imagine trying to build a chest of drawers if you had only seen a few of them.

To become fully aware of mouldings, it’s best to study their forms from about 1400 to the present. That’s outside the scope of this particular blog entry. But we can help you with the more recent stuff.

Thanks to Eric Brown, we are accumulating a nice collection of hard-to-find references on moulding shapes. Eric has a bad/good habit of picking up woodworking ephemera when he sees it and sends a good deal of it my way so I can share it here.

Thor Mikesell has digitized three of these catalogs for us. Thor is a new student to traditional woodworking, with a background in trim and finish work as well as scenic construction for the stage. He lives in Eugene, Ore., with his wife, Holly and their two dogs.

There are three catalogs for you to download, study and enjoy. All are in pdf format.

The first is the 1938 “Arkansas Soft Pine Handbook,” which was published as a way to promote use of Pinus echinata, a shortleaf pine that is technically a yellow pine but was being promoted as great for interior trim.

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Aside from the interesting marketing of this pine that I grew up with, there is a fantastic visual guide to mouldings in this 68-page booklet. It is well worth downloading and taking a look at.

The second booklet is “Mouldings Millwork No. 72” from the Foremost Lumber Corp. in Brooklyn, NY. It has a similar (but not identical) array of mouldings.

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And the third is is “F&E Original Doors and Moldings” from F&E in Los Angeles.

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Take a look and you will be well on your way to getting a feel for the curves of traditional millwork flow and work together.

Thanks to Eric and Thor for their 100-percent volunteer help with these catalogs.

— Christopher Schwarz

If you want to learn to make mouldings by hand, we publish Matt Bickford’s “Mouldings in Practice,” which is just going into its second printing.

‘Book of Plates’ – Why no Digital Version?

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Several readers have asked why we don’t offer a digital version of “l’Art du Menuisier: The Book of Plates” when we sell digital versions of almost all of our other titles. It’s a fair question.

My answer will seem lame until Nov. 19, which is when the book ships.

During the last five years of dealing with A.J. Roubo’s “l’Art du Menuisier” on a daily basis, I have come to understand how the work was supposed to be read. I’ve read and edited about one-third of Roubo’s translated work now, and I used the plates constantly to follow along with the prose.

Time and again, I reluctantly but with a secret  joy returned to the full-size 18th-century originals to help me decipher Roubo’s text. At first, having those plates on the screen of a computer seemed like a good idea so I could zoom in on details. But the plates are not just collections of little images that are meant to be digested one bit at a time.

Instead, each plate is like a living organism. Every drawing relates to the other bits on the plate. So staring at one detail will at times mislead you, or at least induce an unintentional myopia.

The plates are meant to be taken as a whole. Otherwise, what you have is like a map of Ohio with Cleveland, Columbus and Marietta missing.

But there’s more. The physicality of the original volumes is important. We wanted to try to give readers a small taste of that by printing the plates full-size and on paper that is usually reserved for corporate annual reports or art books.

To be honest, publishing “The Book of Plates” might be a financial misstep for Lost Art Press. This book was more expensive than any other single project we’ve undertaken. We had to print a large number of books in order to get the price down to a reasonable level, $100. And even then, the margins on this book are much smaller than usual for us.

We did this because we want to share this somewhat magical experience with you. And we wanted to do it so you didn’t have to spend $1,500 to $10,000 for the experience of seeing these plates as they were intended.

And that is why we are not issuing a digital edition.

— Christopher Schwarz

“The Book of Plates” is available in the Lost Art Press store for $100 with free domestic shipping until Nov. 19, 2014.

Hand Tool Makers – at Arm’s Length

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This summer in Maine, a bunch of us got a beer with Thomas Lie-Nielsen after examining a tool collection at a museum. When the check came for the drinks, Thomas picked it up and said, “My treat.”

I gave him a $20 bill, and he took it. Some of the other people around the table looked confused. Should they also pay? Was Chris just being a weiner?

“Chris and I have an odd relationship,” Thomas said, putting the $20 in his wallet.

That is a bit of an understatement.

This blog entry is written for all of the toolmakers out there who I adore and respect but are bemused by my sometimes-standoffish behavior. For a wide variety of reasons, I have always kept a certain amount of distance between myself and the people who make my tools. I don’t take free or discounted tools. If you try to buy me a beer, I will buy you a six pack. Send me an unsolicited tool and I’ll send you a check.

I do this for a simple reason: If you ask me to write something nice about your tools to help your sales, I can look you in the eye and say “no.” If I tell my students or readers that I like your tools, then they can be assured that I am not the tool of the toolmaker.

Plus, in order for me to sleep at night, I need to own every tool in my chest. No gifts. No discounts or favors. I pay the iron price for my iron.

Where does this crazy attitude come from? Journalism school.

During college, my wife and I were indoctrinated into the school of thought that you take nothing – nothing – from the people you write about. This cold approach makes you seem less friendly, but it will save your reputation in the end.

(My wife, Lucy, a reporter at a local television station, won’t even take a drink of water from the public fountains at city hall or the school district. She’s even more hardcore than I am – one of the things I love about her, by the way.)

So toolmakers: Don’t take it personal. I support your work. I love the risks you take. And I have a weird and somewhat embarrassing relationship with the things you make for me. But if I seem off-putting, remember this: It’s me. Not you.

— Christopher Schwarz

You Can Call Him ‘Roy Jr.’

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I wish I had thought of this Halloween costume for my kids when they were helpless. These days it’s a struggle to get my 18-year-old daughter to wear a handlebar moustache.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Leo, who is dressed today as Roy Underhill.

And it looks like Roy approves of the costume.

— Christopher Schwarz

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