The Chairmaker’s Toolbox is accepting applications for a scholarship class this August at Lost Art Press. All six students will receive free tuition and materials (plus some meals) during the week-long chairmaking class, Aug. 3-7.
Apply for this scholarship class here. Applications close on May 15.
The class will be taught by Grace Ambrose and me (Chris). During the five days, we will all build comb-back chairs using basic tools and simple techniques practiced by peasants and farmers during the last 300 years. No previous chairmaking experience is required. You don’t need to own a chest full of tools. You just have to really want to build chairs.
The Chairmaker’s Toolbox helps people who have historically been excluded or under-represented from the craft. We have supported this organization from its inception and welcome anyone and everyone into the craft. In addition to The Chairmaker’s Toolbox, we support many other scholarship programs for veterans, woodworkers with financial needs and those who struggle with mental health.
This class will take place in our workshop in Covington, Kentucky, which is a converted German barroom in the inner city. Each day begins with pastries, tea and coffee. Our bench room is filled with natural light and traditional workbenches. After a morning of chairmaking, students eat lunch in our converted biergarten (weather permitting), followed by a long afternoon of work at the bench.
Evenings are up to the students. Some go out to dinner in one of the many dive bars and restaurants in the 100-percent walkable neighborhood. Others cook for themselves.
By the end, all of the students will walk away from the class with a finished chair and the knowledge to make chairs in their own workshop.
This is one of our favorite weeks every year. These classes are filled with sharp and interesting people who are ready to change the craft for the better.
If this sounds like fun (it is), apply here and join us this August.
Jacob finished sweeping the leaves from the front steps of his cabinetmaker’s shop and stood looking down the street. Many of the shop windows and front porches in this older neighborhood were decorated for the harvest season with bunches of corn stalks, hay bales and pumpkins. With Halloween a few weeks away, cobwebs would soon be added between porch supports and ghostly faces would materialize in attic windows. As she did every year, Mrs. Hanratty celebrated the Irish origins of Halloween by adding several carved turnips between the pumpkins on her front stoop. Jacob favored this more traditional celebration of the season and very much disliked blinking orange lights, screaming skeletons and the like. Maybe I’m getting old he thought, but I just like the old ways better.
“Come on, Georgie,” he called to his cat, “time to get to work!” Hearing a meow above his head, he looked up to see his black and white cat clinging to the top of a corn stalk at one side of the front door. Jacob reached up and brought the cat and a shower of shredded stalks down into his arms. “Very silly, cat, very silly,” he said as he entered the shop and closed the door. Georgie jumped from Jacob’s arms and strolled to the back of the shop and sat down next to two large piles of oak boards. “You’re reading my mind, Georgie. I’ve got to sort through those this morning. Let’s hope there are enough clear boards for the bookcases and table I’m going to make.”
After an hour, all but two of the shorter boards had been examined, and Jacob was satisfied he would have enough oak for his commission work. He reached for the next to last board, and saw, about a third of the way down from the top a swirling grain pattern. “Damn! Cat face!” he exclaimed. He ran his hand over the reverse grain and saw how the pattern extended from the edge to half way across the face of the board. Trying to decipher what he saw he took the board to the big front windows. The grain pattern looked like a cat’s head in profile. He propped the board against the nearby wall and stepped back. “That’s a big cat’s head,” he said, “big enough to be a tiger.” Georgie trotted over to the board, stood on his hind legs and touched a paw to the bottom edge of the pattern. Dropping down, he rubbed his cheek along the edge of the board while purring like a outboard boat motor. Laughing at his cat’s antics, Jacob picked up the board, and with his cat following close behind, said, “I’ll put your new favorite board buddy out of the way against the back wall.”
Several days later, Jacob called Georgie to come and eat his supper. No cat came careening through the kitchen door. He called again and still no cat. “Are you in front of the board again?” he called. Jacob crossed the kitchen, went through the open door and up three steps, crossed the landing in five strides, went down six steps and through the door into his shop. He found Georgie sitting in front of the oak board staring at the cat face. “What are you doing?” asked Jacob, “It’s your supper time! Come along!” Georgie didn’t move. Jacob looked from Georgie to the cat face once, twice and even in the darkened shop something about the board was different. The grain pattern looked as though it had spread further across the face of the board. Jacob turned on the overhead light to get a better look. “What the..?” he started to say and stepped back, startled. Another step back and he tripped on the shop stool and landed on his ass. “Georgie! It’s moving! Get away from it!” he yelled. But, Georgie stayed right were he was and, once again, turned on his motor and purred.
Jacob, too, stayed right were he was. He knew his mouth was hanging open, but he couldn’t get it to stay closed. He also could not pull his eyes away from the cat face as it rippled and stretched across the face of the board. Now, he could make out what seemed to be two eyes and a mouth. It’s a tiger’s face he thought and quickly put that thought out of his mind. “It’s just a board,” he said aloud for Georgie’s benefit. Then, the “eyes” blinked and Jacob sprang to his feet, grabbed a protesting Georgie, ran through and slammed the shop door, leapt up six steps, crossed the landing in two strides, slammed the door and skipping the three steps, jumped straight down to the kitchen floor. Jacob put the struggling cat on the floor and announced, “We are not going back to the shop tonight! We will have our supper, have a quiet evening and go to bed!”
In the morning, Jacob woke feeling tired and cranky. He left the house for his regular pre-dawn walk puzzling over what he saw, or thought he saw, the night before. Something was up with Georgie, too. That cat never refused a meal. Following his morning routine, Jacob opened the shop, swept the front steps and sidewalk and waved to Mrs. Hanratty, the other early-riser on this end of the street.
As soon as his cat ran into the shop, he camped out in front of the board. Urging the cat to move away, Jacob said, “It’s just weird graining in the wood, come on, Georgie! Or stay there, have it your way!” As he walked towards his workbench Jacob heard a low rumble similar to a cat’s purring. He turned and saw the “mouth” in the cat face pattern open wider and wider as it’s “eyes” got smaller and smaller. Transfixed, and feeling his hair standing on end, Jacob stood with his own mouth agape. He heard the low rumble again and then, in a deep voice, the cat face said, “Oh, oh, that felt good! I have not been able to yawn, ever! I think I will do it again!” Jacob watched as another yawn was accomplished. Finding his voice, he asked, “You couldn’t yawn?” “Oh, not at all,” rumbled the face, “stuck on the edge of the board, I was.” “I see,” replied Jacob hearing his own voice rising into a squeak. And, try as he might, he could not stifle his own yawn.
“No, this is not happening! You, I mean that board, can’t stay in the shop!” Jacob wrapped a tarp over the board and carried it down to the shop basement. All the while he was muttering, “It didn’t yawn, I didn’t yawn. There was no yawn catching between the board and me!” He scooped up his cat, went back up the basement steps and closed and locked the door. “I have a commission to complete!” he exclaimed and strode purposely towards his workbench.
Jacob endured another restless night and rose with a headache and groaned, “Ugh, only one beer with supper and I feel hungover.” Georgie, for his part, ignored Jacob and went downstairs to wait for his breakfast. While in the shower, and later in the kitchen making breakfast, Jacob had the refrain from a song stuck in his head. He didn’t have the words, only the tune. What is the name of the song he kept thinking, I know it, but I don’t.
Once he was working at his bench he felt better. His headache was gone, but not the earworm. He kept whistling or humming the unknown refrain still wondering what was the song. He was sitting at his desk taking a mid-morning coffee break when he heard it. That’s the song! Where the heck was it coming from? No one was outside the shop front, no cars were rolling by. It was coming from the basement. He hurried to unlock the basement door to find who was down there and heard a very deep voice singing, “All byyy myyyself, don’t want to beee, all byyy myyyself anymore. All byyyy myyyself…” Jacob tore the tarp off the board and yelled, “It was you! All night something was bothering my sleep and now, I can’t get that song out of my head! Stop singing!” “Good day, Jacob! I will stop sing that song if you put me back in the shop. I spent a long time in the dark and prefer to stay in the light. Thank you!” Without replying, Jacob carried the board up the steps and leaned it against the back wall of the shop. All the while he was thinking, I’m a cabinetmaker at the mercy of a cat face board. Is this punishment for an egregious woodworking mistake I made in my youth? Am I going mad? And, how does it know my name? He was determined to ignore the board. He would concentrate on his work, on sawdust and shavings, on sawdust and shavings.
The truce lasted just a couple days. From time to time, Jacob was aware of a low humming coming from the board, but he was unable to decipher any words or a known song. He was at the kitchen table enjoying a lunch of left-over spaghetti when he heard it. He knew that song! It was one of his favorites! He rushed to the shop and before he could help himself started belting out, in unison with the cat face, “Don’t your feet get cold in the winter time, the sky won’t snow and the sun won’t shine, it’s hard to tell the night time from the day!” The board stopped singing and commanded, “Jacob! Jacob! Pull the tarp over me, something is coming!” Startled, Jacob did as he was told. “Now, keep singing,” whispered the cat face. Jacob continued singing, “You’re losing all your highs and lows, ain’t it funny…” He heard the bell ring as the shop door opened, turned and stepped forward to face the visitor, a short figure in a dirty black coat and pants, his cap pulled low over his eyes. Jacob began, “May I help,” when he was cut off. In a rough voice, the newcomer asked, “Have ya got any spare wood, maybe some boards ya don’t want?” “I don’t sell any lumber. Any wood I order is used in my business. Try the lumberyard or the big box stores,” replied Jacob. The newcomer stepped forward and leaning toward Jacob said, “Are ya sure ya have no boards you want to get rid of?” With a sneer he continued, “Some that aren’t good enough for the fancy goods ya make here? Something ya plan to put in the burn pile?” In a clear voice Jacob replied, “I have nothing for you here, now leave!” The visitor swore, spat on the floor and stomped out of the shop.
From under the tarp the cat face spoke, “Lock the door!” Jacob turned towards the board and asked, “Why? You said something was coming, not someone. What was that?” “I am not sure,” replied the cat face, “I sensed it one other time, soon after my tree was cut into parts at the sawmill. My board was pulled from the stack and put aside. Later, one of the men at the sawmill put my board back with the others and here I am!” “So, somebody intended to steal your board from the sawmill? Woodworkers usually don’t use a board with a cat face, the reverse graining causes tear-out,” said Jacob. “Yes, someone wanted my board and as you can see, I am not just a cat face,” replied the cat face. What am I? I do not yet know, but I can sense when evil is present. That thing that came to the shop was up to no good and will surely be back. Deep in the night, the cat face, safely tucked in the basement, woke with a start. He sensed that the evil was back. Seconds later, Jacob was jolted awake by his shop fire detector. As he was calling the fire department, he heard the fire truck, siren blaring, round the corner to his street. He ran downstairs and went through to the shop. He could see flames outside the front window and grabbed a fire extinguisher. As he advanced towards the door he heard a bellow coming from the basement. “Jacob stay inside! Stay inside!”
“It was deliberately set,” the Fire Chief advised Jacob. “Looks like we have an arsonist in town. Know anybody with a grudge against you?” Jacob told the Chief about his odd visitor and provided a description. “I’ll ask the Police Chief to increase patrols around here, also, get your neighbors involved in keeping an eye out for anything unusual.” Mrs. Hanratty, standing at the front of the gathered crowd, piped in, “That we will! Don’t worry Jacob, we’ll keep you safe!” Smiling, Jacob thanked her and as she marched back to her house – Mrs. Hanratty never walked, she marched – he imagined her as a gunny in the Marine Corps.
“We have to have a plan,” said Mrs. Hanratty to the large group of neighbors ranged around Jacob’s shop. There was a mass nodding of heads. There were suggestions of building barricades at each end, “Like we did in Paris in ‘68!” exclaimed Jean-Michel, the upholster, who was all of 55 years old. Patrols were set, plans were made to distribute radios for communication along with other arrangements. Although he was discouraged from doing so, Dante, the roofer’s son, was going to set up his pumpkin trebuchet on the roof of their shop. “Just in case, you know, just in case we need some firepower,” he reassured the group.
As the meeting broke up, Jacob asked Mrs. Hanratty to stay behind. He told her all about the cat face on the board and then took her to the basement. Standing before the board, she gave a start when the eyes blinked. “This is quite remarkable. May I touch your face?” she asked, her voice soft and low. “Yes you may,” came the response. She felt a ripple under her fingers as she traced the grain that formed a stripe. “It feels like a mild electric current runs under the surface. Jacob, have you felt this?” she asked. “Yes, on my shoulder, the first time I carried the board down here,” he answered. Turning back to the cat face she said, “There are many tales of spirits living or being trapped in trees. There are changes cause by nature such a lightning, fire or floods. Do you know your name or your purpose? Do you have any memory of the time you were in the tree?” “I was not fully awake, or possibly fully alive, until Jacob lifted the board and turned it toward the sunshine coming through the front window of the shop,” he answered. “Mmmm, the light,” mused Mrs. Hanratty, “that’s interesting. It is very likely the evil beings trying to catch you are planning some awful ritual, or they fear your power and want to kill you. Either way, we will stop them.” Hearing her soft musings followed by her steely resolve had Jacob’s eyebrows halfway to his hairline. He escorted her out of the basement and to the front door. As she began the short walk to her house, she looked back and said, “It’s battle stations, Jacob, battle stations! I’m going to carve more turnips!” “Turnips?” he called. “To keep the beasties away! That’s what my ancestors did,” came the answer.
The plan for Halloween was to keep Jacob inside his shop and the cat face in the basement. Mrs. Hanratty was elected to direct operations and was to position herself outside Jacob’s shop. Lookouts were on several roofs and everyone readied themselves for a street fight. “Like Paris in ‘68!” repeated the too-young-to-have-been there, Jean-Michel.
Not long after the last of the trick-or-treaters left the neighborhood, Mrs. Hanratty walked over to Jacob’s shop front. “You’re carrying a hockey stick?” he laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous! It’s a hurley!” she answered. Her radio crackled with news of a multi-car accident and fire on the other side of town. “And so it begins,” she announced over her radio, “the little beasties are keeping the cops busy elsewhere. Art, you see anything?” she asked one of the rooftop spotters. “There’s a dark mass of something-or-other moving along the street from the east,” reported Art, “looks like a they’re knocking out the street lights as they advance. Creepy! I’m guessing there are a couple hundred of ‘em and they’re starting to light torches! And, they’re chanting!”
“Marcus, get the sauce ready!” directed Mrs. Hanratty. “As soon as they reach the first intersection, fire away.” Repurposing his drones used to help inspect roofs, Marcus and his crew of roofers flew their drones above the creepy beasties and released the sauce. Torches were extinguished and the beasties were coated in gallons of the local diner’s extra-flaming hot sauce. The street echoed with screams, powerful swearing and about a quarter of the invaders ran off. The neighborhood brigade could now hear the chants coming from the beasties. “Cast out the cat or burn! Cast out the cat! Cast out the cat or burn!” they shrieked as they marched.
The drones were brought back and reloaded. “Commence goo drop!” ordered Mrs. Hanratty, “we have to douse those torches.” The goo worked as expected, putting out the torches, coating the beasties with fluorescent green and slowing their march towards the second intersection and Jacob’s shop. “Second batch of goo!” commanded Mrs. Hanratty. Dante, up on the roof with his dad, radioed a request to use the trebuchet. “By all means, Dante, blast them with everything you’ve got!” Within minutes, a rapid volley of pumpkins, decorative gourds, squashes and turnips came sailing through the air. “Excellent, Dante! Keep ‘em coming!” exclaimed Mrs. Hanratty, but she was worried. The vegetal fusillade, while causing the delightful sight of beasties with pumpkin heads and gourds jammed into mouths and ears, it was not enough. The accumulation of hot sauce, goo and vegetable guts in the street was only slowing, not stopping, the advance of the beasties. They were in trouble.
Jacob, not allowed to leave his shop, watched and worried. The horde would surely hurt his neighbors, destroy their homes and kill the cat face. Beneath his feet he felt the floor vibrate. “Jacob!” came the deep rumble of the cat face. He ran down to the basement and, almost falling, came to an abrupt stop. The figure of the cat face was glowing. “Jacob, you must take me the roof of your house, do it now!” rumbled the cat. “Why? What can you do?” Jacob asked, confused by the cat’s request. “Please, Jacob!
They are here because of me and I know what must be done to protect you and all the neighbors. Please, do it now!” Georgie standing watch over the cat face paced back and forth. “Put Georgie somewhere safe, he can’t be allowed to follow us,” demanded the cat face. Jacob got on the radio to let the neighborhood brigade know what he was about to do and to be prepared for anything. Mrs. Hanratty responded, “He has found his purpose.”
With Georgie safe in the kitchen, Jacob began the long climb up the stairs to the attic. The board felt heavier and warmer with each step. By the third floor, his shirt was soaked with sweat and his breathing labored. He propped the board against the wall and opened the door that led to the narrow steps to the roof. “What are you going to do?” he asked the cat face, “what can you do?” “Hurry, Jacob, hurry!” came the answer. Jacob complied and once on the roof he placed the board with the cat face facing east. It was windy and he shivered. His hands stung from the heat of the board and his shoulders ached. He was startled when the deep voice of the cat face told him to step well back. Wisps of smoke rose from the edges of the board and the graining of the cat face grew out from the surface. “I must go now, Jacob. Thank you for not putting me on the burn pile!” Jacob fell back as he watched the head and neck of an enormous white tiger emerge from the board, followed by the rest of its body and tail.
The tiger was at least 10′ long. The wood grain pattern had turned coal black and its white fur glowed as though lit from within. Intense heat radiated from the tiger and its tail whipped back and forth. It swung its head, its eyes meeting and holding Jacob’s, then turned and leapt from the roof straight down to the street. His voice cracking, Jacob called on the radio, “Cat face, I mean tiger, on it way down!” The neighborhood brigade watched as the tiger landed in the street, its giant paws burning prints into the street surface. The tiger roared and charged towards the beasties swatting the vile creatures high into the sky. Beasties trying to swarm him were burned to a crisp when they touched his body. Others were caught in its mouth and swallowed whole. From his perch on the roof, Jacob saw white flames trailing behind the tiger as it chased the beasties. He watched until he no longer could see tiger or flames. He picked up what was left of the board and dragged himself down the steps in his house and on to his shop. His neighbors waited outside, some sitting, some leaning. It was one o’clock in the morning and he was a wreck, they all were. “Do you think he’ll come back?” asked Dante. “I don’t know how he can,” answered Jacob.
“He doesn’t really exist in our world, does he? I don’t know.” “He saved us, that’s for sure,” someone murmured and, too tired to speak, they all nodded in agreement. “Everybody to bed,” ordered Mrs. Hanratty, “we’ll start the cleanup tomorrow, or later today, or whatever.”
Jacob tossed and turned unable to sleep after what he had witnessed. He felt a deep sense of loss. Georgie had finally settled down and fell asleep sprawled in front of the remnant of the cat face board. Just before dawn, his mind still unsettled and yearning for sleep, he heard a hoarse whisper. “Jacob, I am at my end. Please take care of the little one I have sent you.” He jumped out of bed, ran down the steps and into the kitchen, through the door, up the steps, across the landing, down the steps, through the shop door, across the shop, fumbled with his keys, opened the door to the street and found a skinny and dirty orange tabby kitten curled against the wall. It had lost its right eye and the ends of its whiskers were curled as though it had been too close to an open flame. As he picked up the kitten he could smell smoke in its fur. His legs wouldn’t hold him and he sat right down on the sidewalk in front of his shop door.
Hours later, this is where Mrs. Hanratty found him, fast asleep with a sleeping orange kitten in his arms. She took her coat off, covered him with it and left him to wake in his own time.
South Arts, a nonprofit regional arts organization that supports artists and organizations, is now accepting applications for its FY26 Emerging Traditional Artists Program (ETAP).
“This program recognizes and supports a new generation of traditional artists that have demonstrated a high level of skill in, commitment to, and leadership in their traditional art form. Artists must reside in anAppalachian Regional Commission-designated County in Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, or Tennessee. Awards provide financial support to ETAP participants to ensure the continuation of traditional knowledge and artistic skills within their cultural communities.”
ETAP artists receive $5,000, and participate in workshops to further their education and opportunities.
ETAP “advances the purpose of the In These Mountains initiative to ‘provide intergenerational opportunities to share, teach, learn, preserve, document, and carry forward the folk and traditional arts and culture of Central Appalachia.’”’ For emerging traditional artists who have demonstrated a commitment to their artform and community and exhibit a high skill level, this award will provide resources for learning opportunities that would otherwise be inaccessible.
It is, above all, succinct, easy to understand and perfectly suited for the furniture-maker. As important as what is in its 160 pages is what is not. It’s not a detailed analysis of cell growth. It is not a heap of tables and equations for figuring truss loads in residential construction. It is decidedly not a scientist’s approach to the material.
Instead, “With the Grain” contains the facts you need to know at the lumberyard, in the woodlot and in the shop. It gives you enough science so you understand how trees grow. It explains the handful of formulas you have to know as a furniture-maker. And it gives you a hearty dose of specific information about North American species that will inspire you. Becksvoort encourages you to use the trees in your neighborhood and makes the case that just because you cannot find catalpa at the lumberyard doesn’t mean it’s not a good furniture wood.
You’ll learn to identify the trees around you from their silhouette, leaves and shoots. And you’ll learn about how these species work in the shop – both their advantages and pitfalls.
Becksvoort then takes you into a detailed discussion of how wood reacts to it environment – the heart of the book. You’ll learn how to calculate and accommodate wood movement with confidence and precision. And you’ll learn how to design furniture assemblies – casework, drawers, doors and moulding – so they will move with the seasons without cracking.
Wood Structure Wood, or xylem, is the cellular material that makes up the bulk of the tree. It consists mainly of dead, hollow cells. Chemically, wood is composed of 40-50 percent cellulose, 20-35 percent hemicellulose, and 15-30 percent lignin. Cellulose is a very long, complex molecular chain, which, when broken down, yields the simple sugar glucose. Hemicellulose, closely associated with cellulose, is composed of shorter molecular chains of several types of sugar. Lignin is an intercellular material that bonds the wood fibers together. Aside from these three major components, various extractives are also present in the wood. Although not part of the wood structure, the extractives are usually found mostly in the cell walls, and contribute to the wood’s characteristic color, odor, taste, decay resistance and flammability. These secondary ingredients include oils, tannins, waxes, gums, starches, alkaloids, color materials and about 1-2 percent ash-forming minerals such as calcium and silica.
Figure 1-1 shows a typical cross section of a hardwood stem. (A) is the cambium layer, only a few cell layers thick, which produces the bark (phloem) toward the outside of the tree, and wood (xylem) toward the inside of the tree. Cambium extends in a continuous layer between the wood and bark, and gives rise to the tree’s lateral growth. In the temperate zones, during the course of one growing season, one new ring of wood is added to the trunk, roots and branches. Wood formed the previous year does not continue to grow. The width of the growth rings is not necessarily consistent in size, even within a species. Ash, for example, when grown in an area of little rainfall and poor soil, may have up to 40 rings per inch (2.5 cm), slow growth, while the same species grown in an area of abundant moisture and nutrients may have only 4 or 5 rings per inch, or fast growth. Slow versus fast growth also depends on competition from neighboring trees. (B) is the newly formed inner bark, a soft, fibrous material that carries food down from the leaves to all parts of the tree. During the growing season, the cambium layer and the inner bark are very soft and fragile. This means that logs cut during the spring and summer will have easily peeled bark, whereas those cut during the late fall and winter will usually retain their bark. (C) is the dead, corky, outer bark. As the diameter of the tree increases year by year, the bark becomes thicker and begins to crack. With age it usually becomes quite thick and furrowed (except in trees like beech and birch), and begins to slough off from the action of wind and weather.
The newly formed wood is the sapwood (D). It constitutes from one or two to more than 200 years growth (in some conifers), depending on the species (Fig. 1-2). Sapwood functions primarily to conduct water and minerals from the roots to the leaves. Most of the newly formed cells die in a short time. A few, the parenchyma cells, retain their protoplasm in the cell cavity and act as living food-storage cells. After a number of years, the sapwood loses its function and turns to heartwood (Fig. 1-1 E). The last of the parenchyma cells die, leaving only the cell walls that give the tree structural support. Extractives are deposited in the heartwood cells, giving the wood its distinctive color and other properties. Sapwood, having no extractives (some of which are toxic to fungi), is not as decay-resistant as heartwood, and should not be used under conditions conducive to decay. The extractives present in the heartwood of some species add to the mass of the cells, and increase the density of the wood somewhat.
Fig. 1-2. Number of Annual Rings in the Sapwood of Common Hardwoods. Source: Charles Sprague Sargent, Manual of the Trees of North America
The pith is located in the center of the tree (Fig. 1-1 F). This is a soft, sometimes spongy material formed behind the apical meristem. In most species it is only slightly visible as a darker tube. In some trees such as black walnut (Fig. 1-3), butternut and sumac, the pith is quite pronounced. Surrounding the pith is an indistinct area known as juvenile, or pith wood, characterized by wide growth rings (especially in conifers), low density and strength, and greater longitudinal shrinkage.
Radiating from the pith outward are the rays (Fig. 1-1 G). They extend to the cambium and are used in lateral transport of nutrients through the sapwood. Rays tend to bind the wood, thereby reducing the radial dimensional change.
Fig. 1-3. Pith in Black Walnut
Trees grown in temperate climates have a cycle of growth and dormancy that results in the appearance of annual rings. Typically, each spring as growth resumes, the cambial layer produces an abundance of large, thin-walled cells. Spring is a time of mild temperatures, maximum daylight and ample rainfall. Consequently, cell growth is quick and profuse. This initial growth is known as early-wood, or spring-wood. As the season progresses and day length decreases, the weather gets hotter and drier and growth slows. Cell formations become smaller and thicker-walled. These are the late-wood cells. Finally, during autumn growth stops for the season. Because the late-wood cells have thicker walls that portion of the growth ring is more dense. This is most apparent in old, weathered wood, which takes on a ridged appearance as the early-wood erodes faster than the dense late-wood.
Some tropical woods have no apparent growth rings. In areas where the weather is constant yearround, growth continues uninterrupted.
Classification of Trees Botanically, trees are divided into two classes: gymnosperms and angiosperms. Commercially, woods are divided into softwoods and hardwoods, softwoods referring to the gymnosperms and hardwoods referring to the angiosperms. These terms should not be taken literally, because not all softwoods are soft (yellow pine is about as hard as black walnut), nor are all hardwoods hard (basswood, and cottonwood are quite soft). Because these terms will continue to be used in the trade, the knowledgeable woodworker should recognize that they are used merely to distinguish the two groups, not define them.
Gymnosperms, characterized by exposed seeds, are the older of the two groups, and include all the conifers and even gingko (commonly thought of as a hardwood because of its broad, deciduous leaves). Conifers are characterized by their single, straight trunk and needle-shaped leaves, which are retained all year (except for cypresses and larches). Needles, usually smaller than leaves, have a waxlike coating that prevents water loss during long periods of dormancy. Thus adapted, the conifers are the dominant trees in the northern forest.
Coniferous wood is fairly simple (primitive) in structure. It is composed predominantly (roughly 90 percent) of all-purpose tracheid cells, which are long, thin and hollow. Although the cells are closed at both ends, liquids pass from one cell to the next through “pits” in the cell walls. Conifers also contain medullary rays. Some of the conifers also contain resin canals, which are large (visible), tubular passages that exude resin, or pitch. These canals occur in the species of pine (Pinus), larch (Larix), spruce (Picea) and Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga). Conifers lack specialized vessels or pores. The entire group is classified as having nonporous wood.
On a cellular level, the angiosperms are more specialized than the gymnosperms. They contain more ray cells (from 6 percent to 31 percent by volume), and only about 25 percent of the wood consists of fibers. These, like the tracheids in conifers, are long, thin cells with thick walls that give the tree support. From 6 percent to 55 percent of the wood is composed of vessels, or tubular openended cells. They have thin walls and large diameters, specifically made for the conduction of sap. When the vessels are exposed by cutting, they are called pores. Wood with large vessels such as oak, ash or chestnut are said to be open-pored, or opengrained. When exposed on any surface, these vessels are readily visible by eye or with a hand lens, and can be felt by a fingernail across what appears to be a smooth surface. Because vessel sizes vary widely among species, designation such as open- or close-grain are relative. What is more important is the arrangement of the vessels in the growth rings.
When large vessels (pores) are formed primarily in the early-wood, the wood is called ring-porous. The vessels form a distinct band in the early-wood (Fig. 1-4). Vessels, although present in the late-wood, are much smaller and fewer. Ring-porous woods include ash, hickory, oaks, chestnut, elm, sassafras and locust.
At the other extreme are the woods that are diffuse porous (Fig.1-5), those with pores scattered evenly throughout the year’s growth. The pores are all about equal in size, so the early-wood and late-wood are therefore indistinct. Maple, birch, dogwood, beech, holly, poplar, magnolia, hornbeam, sycamore, willow and basswood are all diffuse-porous.
Between these two distinct groups are the semi-ring porous (or semi-diffuse porous) woods (Fig. 1-6). The main characteristic of these woods is a gradual change from large vessels in the earlywood to smaller vessels in the late-wood. Species that have semi-ring porous wood include catalpa, persimmon and plum. Certain species of hickory, walnut, oak and willow are sometimes included in this group.
The pores of exposed end-grain heartwood will sometimes appear clogged with a frothy, film-like substance called tyloses. Tyloses is formed in some species when the sapwood turns to heartwood. In woods such as red oak, cherry, maple, dogwood and honeylocust tlyloses is insignificant or totally absent. In others such as white oak, tyloses development is quite extensive, while in Osage orange and black locust, the vessels are tightly filled.
Catalan chair, c. 1950, original red paint. Photo from Antigues Matèries, Barcelona.
The Catalan variation of the of the post-and-rung chair has been traced back to the late19th century and is still made today. This native of Catalonia speaks to me; it whispers, “sit back and relax.”
As with its straight-backed relatives, these chairs were made with local woods and reed-woven seats. The chair back is inclined and typically has four slats. There are two rungs at the front and sides and one at the back. Two additional legs at the back provide thesupport for the inclined angle of the chair.The comfort of this vernacular chair is the inclined seat and the high and wide back.
Four views of another chair, c. 1930, photo from 1st Dibs.
Details include decorative turnings on the front post, especially at the base. Each chair that I’ve found has, for lack of a better term, a “beanie cap” turning at the top of the back post.
Detail of the “beanie cap” on the back post.
Salvador Dalí, native of Catalonia, owned armed versions of the six-legged chair at his home in Portlligat, Spain.
Dalí and Christine Argillet (daughter of Pierre Argillet, Dalí´s publisher) at Portlligat, Spain. Photo from Ms. Argullet via Richmond Magazine.
Rodríguez Aria (1902-1987) was a founding member of GATCPAC, a group of architects and technicians concerned with improving urban development and the quality of life in Barcelona. He was on the Republican side in the Civil War and eventually left Spain and exiled to Chile. He hadcharge of the interior design of Café Miraflores in Santiago de Chile, a gathering place for exiled Spanish intellectuals. His design for the café‘s chairs were a call back to the Catalan vernacular chair.
Germán Rodríguez Arias’ design for the Café Miraflores chairs, 1942. Photo from Mobles114.
Two editions of Rodríguez Arias’ chair.
The Catalana 1942 chair. Left: from Mobles114, Barcella. Right: the collection of Museu del Disseny, Barcelona.
This reimagining of the traditional Catalan six-legged chair is in line with the work done by Charlotte Perriand in the mid-1930s. After working with steel, she moved to the wooden vernacular furniture of her grandparent’s Savoie home as inspiration for her designs. I always think of these swings in design as a push and pull. There is a push to use new and modern materials, but the pull of the older design is always in the back of the mind.
Both the vernacular version and the Rodríguez Arias version of this chair are still made and, as one would expect, they are expensive.
Traditional Catalan chair, c. 1920 with brown-stained posts and rungs. Photo from Fenix Originals.
I wasable to get the measurements for four chairs dating from the 1920s to the 1950s (one of which is not pictured):
Height range: 88-100 cm (34.6-39.4 in.)
Width range: 48-50 cm (18.9-19.7 in.)
Depth range: 74-80 cm (29.1-31.5 in.)
Now, imagine sitting back in one of these Catalan chairs, preferably along the coast of Catalonia. The heat of the day has passed and as you sip from una copa de vi negre o una cervesa a light breeze surrounds you with the perfume of honeysuckle and orange.
