I have one important piece of advice when I teach our authors to take photos, junior editors to design book pages or students to design chairs. Here it is: Never trust your first instinct. Force yourself to take another photo from a different angle. Make an alternative page layou … | Continue reading
After years of making and fixing mistakes in my work, I have drilled the following routine into my head. I almost never deviate from it, and it has served me well. If your repairs are less than satisfactory at times, there might be something here you can use. So I made a mistake … | Continue reading
“The American Peasant,” my new Substack blog that I seemingly won’t shut up about, has been selected to be featured on Substack’s home page (No. 5 out of five, baby). Plus we’re featured in Substack’s app. What does this mean? Well, we got this cool digital badge, which I have pr … | Continue reading
If you live near North Carolina and need a tool chest, here is a post you should read. A friend of mine died earlier this year, and he left behind his Anarchist’s Tool Chest he built in a class with me and Roy Underhill. The exterior of the poplar chest is almost complete and was … | Continue reading
After a week of teaching at the Woodwright’s School, of course we felt compelled to post an excerpt from Roy Underhill’s “Calvin Cobb: Radio Woodworker! A Novel With Measured Drawings.” Above is one of those measured drawings: Roy’s plan for a mallet featuring a “rising dovetail, … | Continue reading
If you aren’t tired of reading my drivel yet, you might want to check out my second woodworking blog, “The American Peasant,” on Substack. The new blog is about your typical woodworking stuff: tool reviews, carving Hungarian shepherd’s furniture with a tool you’ve never seen, adm … | Continue reading
After making a test joint with Haribo Gummy Bears, I let it sit overnight then subjected the joint to all sorts of abuse with a nail hammer. The joint held as well as any joint I’ve made. And the red squeeze-out had turned from a jelly to rock hard. So Megan Fitzpatrick agreed to … | Continue reading
In today’s glimpse at the Covington Mechanical Library (CML), let’s have a look at some books compiled from magazine articles and by magazine authors, an old “must have,” woodworking humor and the first of our fiction books. I remember seeing a few volumes from the Fine Woodworki … | Continue reading
Roy Underhill announced he will close his Woodwright’s School in Pittsboro, N.C., at the end of the 2023 season. But this is not the end of the school or his career as a woodworking educator. There is a new television show under discussion. Plus his school may appear in another l … | Continue reading
“Ingenious Mechanicks” is my worst-selling book. Since it was released in 2016, we’ve sold about 4,000 copies. But I don’t care. That book changed my workshop life more than any other project I’ve been involved in. Roman workbenches are insanely useful creatures. The only operati … | Continue reading
Furniture maker Phil Lowe once showed me two 55-gallon barrels filled with clear stuff that looked like sand. He got the barrels from a factory that made gummy bears (I think he said the factory went out of business). Anyway, he used the stuff in the barrels – gelatin – to make h … | Continue reading
Whenever Megan Fitzpatrick and I pass through West Virginia, we make a stop at Tamarack Marketplace in West Virginia for gas and a look at the furniture and crafts. Some years we are wowed by… how do I put this?…. what people will pay good money for. Other years there is a balanc … | Continue reading
You may have heard that Aspen Golann, founder of the Chairmaker’s Toolbox – which has selflessly been helping others to learn chairmaking – could now use a little help herself. She has suffered a bad leg break that will keep her out of the shop for about five months. If you can s … | Continue reading
Jack planes are the most-used tool in my hands. Hands down, hands forward and hands back. I’m on my third jack plane iron since 1996. I’ve never even come close to wearing out a plane iron for a smoothing or jointer plane. (I have eaten through some block plane blades, though I b … | Continue reading
by Mattias Hallin While talking chairs over a beer on an evening during the Chair Chat Class week, the conversation eventually turned upon the Swedish stick chair tradition in general, and Mats Palmquist’s 2018 book “Träsmak” in particular. As it happened, that book and a number … | Continue reading
Barely in time for Christmas, we have a batch of our Special Edition Engraved Lump Hammers in the store and ready to ship. This will likely be the last batch before the end of the year. The engraving was designed by Jenny Bower and translated into really fluid toolpaths by machin … | Continue reading
One of the most difficult things of late has been sourcing my beloved sugar pine for tool chest classes. It’s “imported” from the West Coast – and with lumber companies struggling to fill demand and the still-high cost of shipping, it has been impossible to get. I’ve heard time a … | Continue reading
Every year Lucy and I give what we can to a variety of charities. We are picky. Lucy has spent most of her career covering the societal safety net here in Cincinnati. She knows these charities inside and out. She has taught me to be careful as well. We do our research. And look a … | Continue reading
Nothing irritates me more than when I hire a tradesperson, and they spend most of the time criticizing the worker who was there before them. When Lucy and I bought our first house, it had been essentially condemned. All utilities had been shut off. The old coal furnace had been t … | Continue reading
It’s an unusual thing to be a woodworker. My daughter Katherine says her friends give her the strangest looks when she tells them I make furniture for a living. “It’s like I told them, ‘Yeah, my dad’s a court jester.’” Katherine said. Thankfully, I know that some of the 20-someth … | Continue reading
The following in excerpted from “Cut & Dried: A Woodworker’s Guide to Timber Technology,” by Richard Jones. The author has spent his entire life as a professional woodworker and has dedicated himself to researching the technical details of wood in great depth, this material being … | Continue reading
My new blog on Substack, “The American Peasant,” is free to everyone until Dec. 15. After that, some posts will be for subscribers (such as where I talk trash about Captain Kangaroo [JK]), and others will be free. Subscriptions are $5 a month. Or $60 a year. And you will be able … | Continue reading
Our warehouse people must have had some extra coffee today because they managed to get our first batch of Special Edition Engraved Lump Hammers into inventory and all linked up with our fancy computer system. You can buy them here for $165 (free shipping in the United States). Th … | Continue reading
Apologies for intruding on your Sunday with commerce a second time. My daughter Katherie posted a batch of Soft Wax 2.0 in her store and I completely forgot to put something up on the blog. It’s here, just in time for waxing something before the holidays. Notes on the finish: Th … | Continue reading
On Monday or Tuesday we will begin selling our Special Edition Lump Hammers that feature a machine engraving designed by artist Jenny Bower. We’re making 200 of these this year and hope to make another batch next fall. These lump hammers have the same characteristics as our regul … | Continue reading
One of the arguments used by pro-slavery groups was the idea if enslaved people were granted their freedom they would not be able to take care of themselves. Abolitionists like to point out exactly who was doing the work in the states where slavery thrived. A portion of the count … | Continue reading
During our open day on Saturday, carver David Bignell delivered this carving of a skep, our dividers and some bees. This will perch upon our company’s sign in the window of our Covington storefront (the sign was also carved by David). We have several of these emblems that we can … | Continue reading
During the last two decades I’ve entered the orbit of many chairmakers who make Jennie Chairs (from “Make a Chair From a Tree”) and Windsor/Forest chairs. Years ago, I was in a gaggle of them, and they started talking about how little their chairs weighed. I learned that Jennie C … | Continue reading
Registration opens tomorrow at the Marc Adams School of Woodworking (MASW) where I am teaching a weekend class in 2023 in making a staked stool. This is a rare instance of me leaving the nest to teach. But I’m doing it for three reasons. The class is Oct. 14-15, 2023. All the det … | Continue reading
Editor’s note: “Henry Boyd’s Freedom Bed” by Whitney LB Miller is the true story of an incredible 19th-century furniture maker who fought for his freedom, invented a renowned (and patented) bed and helped many enslaved people escape to freedom. For the last 25 years I have walked … | Continue reading
Just in time for the holidays, we have received our first shipment of our USA-made canvas tool rolls, which are available for immediate shipment. The tool rolls are made by the same factory that makes our workshop waist apron, so the build quality and stitching is immaculate. The … | Continue reading
James Krenov, the well-known furniture maker born in Russia, author of the hugely influential “A Cabinetmaker’s Notebook,” for 21 years the lead instructor of what is now the Krenov School in Fort Bragg, Calif., and who died at 88 in 2009, was not always revered. When my late wif … | Continue reading
We’re so hard-core at Lost Art Press that our first question to accountant candidates was “are you a woodworker?” OK – not really. But it turns out our accountant really does spend a fair amount of time in the shop! That’s his work shown above, and he wrote the below. – Fitz The … | Continue reading
It’s been a busy couple of weeks…so yeah – I’m being a bit lazy with this week’s post. Today, we’ll take a look at a tiny collection of, well, a couple of tiny things and a few teaching aids. Starting from the front left, we have calipers inspired by those in the Studley’s tool c … | Continue reading
Writing “Workshop Wound Care,” a field manual that’s part of Lost Art Press’s pocket-book series, combined two things Dr. Jeffery Hill enjoys and loves: medicine and woodworking. Hill, an emergency room physician and active woodworker, organized this 184-page book so you can reso … | Continue reading
I try to keep my tool kit as small as possible. So if I don’t use a tool for a few years, I try to get it into someone else’s hands so they can use it. Sometimes that means selling it or giving it away. Back in 2010 I sold off a bunch of tools... | Continue reading
I’ve been writing a woodworking blog almost every day since two-thousand-and-good-god five (2005). I pretty much have the hang of it now. And I’m happy with its mix of content, the variety of authors and its “voice,” for lack of a better word. I have no desire to throw a monkey w … | Continue reading
I feel a little stupid posting this as I cannot believe I haven’t figured it out before. Likely it’s so obvious that no one thought to tell me. When using a flush-cutting saw (a saw with zero set), I always noticed that the first cut was relatively easy. Then each subsequent cut … | Continue reading
As Lost Art Press enters its 16th year of operations, I am amazed we are still here. We have made so many errors – some of them nearly fatal. Likely the reason we are still operating is that we are too dumb to quit. If I had to “make” every LAP book with a photocopier... | Continue reading
I am always looking for ways to make workholding simpler and less expensive. It feels like a duty after writing 36 books on workbenches. I love my Benchcrafted Hi Vise – we own five of them. But not every woodworker can afford the hardware. And you have to build the vise with woo … | Continue reading
To my friends, the American millionaires, to whom I have given the proceeds of many years of toil on a Nebraska farm, all of whom have leisure, and some of whom have brains enough to comprehend political and social science, this work is respectfully dedicated. — T.G. Tibbles, Ban … | Continue reading
Yes, another brush. This one wasn’t on my list initially. When Mattias Hallin visited our shop this year, he brought some lovely small gifts. One of them was this incredible brush from REMOS. The natural bristles are remarkably stiff and stout. Mattias explained that he uses this … | Continue reading
Our storefront in Covington, Ky., will be open to the public from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. this Saturday (Nov. 26). We will have our complete line of books and tools there for you to inspect, plus a somewhat-special giveaway for the first 144 customers. (Uhhh, it’s a free jumbo eraser, … | Continue reading
One of the many fantastic tips I learned from “The Belligerent Finisher” was using common household materials to burnish wooden surfaces. Burnishing compacts the wood and can add a gorgeous texture. Author John Porritt has several simple tools he uses for this. The coolest one is … | Continue reading
This entry is the sister to yesterday’s entry on our fancy plant mister. We found these vintage glass apothecary bottles and immediately bought some for shop liquids. We keep our backup supply of 50/50 water/alcohol potion in it. The bottles are 7” tall and hold 250ml. The best p … | Continue reading