I’ve always known they were good…

These are loaners, but now I’m cooked. Once you touch them & use them, you have to order some…

 

 

I am in a hurry now, so I won’t get to it til next week or so…therefore you can go here & get ahead of me in line. 

http://www.msbickford.com/

 

Getting ready for Winterthur; dalbergia turnings, dovetailed drawers

planing dalbergia

Well, two days in a row and I come up with my next all-time favorite turning wood. Last time it was the Bolivian rosewood, this time it’s East Indian rosewood.

It’s hard to judge based on one experience turning this stuff, but so far so good. It does require sharp tools, but that’s what we’re supposed to have anyway. I had long wondered about the Boston turnings of the 17th century that feature woods like this…what lathe did they use, how did they cut it, etc. 

I finally decided the thing to do is try some and was glad to find that the pole lathe handled it just fine. Things clunked along, but mostly due to me trying to photograph every step of the way, in part for a record, and mostly for slides for the upcoming Furniture Forum at Winterthur…so juggling lights, camera, tripod, etc then checking the results and adjusting things. 

glued up, octogon-ed, and ready to turn

long sleeves & gloves

the large gouge roughing out the shape

some burnishing w Roubo’s polissoir

mostly done, for the day anyway

Next time I turn this stuff, I will put the camera away & concentrate just on the turning. This example needs a little attention; but it should come out fine.

Meanwhile, I cut one of the small drawers I need…half-blind dovetails join the sides to the front. The rear is rabbeted & nailed to the end of the drawer sides. Spanish cedar moldings will decorate the pine drawer front.

test fit the half-blind DT

groove for side hung action

groove in drawer front for bottom

nailing drawer back to sides

ready for the Forum

 

many irons in the fire…

OK first thing to tell you is that I have been thinking about writing blog posts, but haven’t made any good photographs lately, so not much happening here. But there’s been lots going on. 

Update on the rosewood applied turning project, (http://pfollansbee.wordpress.com/2013/02/24/this-aint-green-woodworking/  )  We’ve known the Boston joiners sometimes used tropical hardwoods for applied turnings for quite some time. Never having worked wood like this, I spoke to many woodworkers – and heard all sorts of nightmarish stories. It’s crazy expensive (nope, these are small bits I need,10 1/2″ long. bought blanks from Woodcraft. Maybe $12-15 each for Bolivian Rosewood and East Indian Rosewood), it will dull your tools something awful (the Bolivian rosewood was not too much of a problem in that regard), you’ll need to wash the surfaces w some noxious chemical to get the glue to hold the parts together prior to turning. (nope again. I even used the cheater liquid hide glue in a bottle, easy and it worked fine), and you’ll need to scrape the shapes on the lathe, rather than shave/turn them. This I assumed on my own, based on reading Moxon on turning “hard” woods like ebony. Nope one more time. My turning tools were pretty sharp, but nothing extreme, worked fine. It was the nicest piece of wood I have ever turned. I did wear long sleeves and gloves, just to be safe. I don’t want to find out that I am allergic to these weird woods. It’s clunky turning w gloves on though…I could hunt down some tight-fitting cotton gloves. It is a museum after all…

turning Bolivian Rosewood on pole lathe

 

I had wondered, after hearing all the stories, if the pole lathe could handle the program. I never should have doubted – when I think back to the 17th-century challenges it makes sense that turning these things shouldn’t be much different from working other woods on the lathe. I doubt these joiners and turners were going to a lot of trouble. I usually operate on the assumption that there was a straight-forward way to get this work done…

 

using the skew to finsh the maximum diameter

just about done on the lathe

I used a polissoir I bought from  Don Williams to burnish the piece while it was spinning in the lathe. Great stuff all around. Now, for tomorrow – the East Indian Rosewood. 

sawing the blanks

truing for gluing

glued up w oak filler

I can’t wait to turn it. Sawing it was weird – it felt like iron. the teeth of the saw barely left a mark. But it cut pretty easily. Very fine dust though…I carefully swept it up.

The other day I went to the MFA to research and study a turned bedstead in their collection. It will show up here later in the month of March…

Today I went to the North Bennett Street School http://www.nbss.edu/index.aspx  to give the furniture students there a dog & pony show – and then wandered around the shop looking at all their work. And took a total of about 3 photographs – I was kicking myself afterwards for not shooting a lot of stuff. That place is an amazing visit. Chock full of furniture, parts, woods, books, tools – it’s great. I hope to go back before too long. 

wall o’ legs NBSS

box o;’ feet

 

I forget if it was last week or the week before, but I taught a carving workshop at the Connecticut Valley School of Woodworking recently. http://www.schoolofwoodworking.com/   We had a great time (I did at least, and I think the students did too) – here’s a few shots:

 

CVSWW wall of samples

using gouges to mark out the design

I thought I had a lot of carving tools

concentration

Leslie diggin the posture

 

I’ll be back there in September for another weekend of carving. Bob Van Dyke supplied near-perfect quartersawn oak. Amazing stuff.

In the meantime, I am still hoping for students out west at the Port Townsend School of Woodworking. Right now, it sounds like we need 6 more students for each workshop. Otherwise, these 2 classes will get cancelled. One is a week-long “make a joint stool” class… the other a 2-day class in carving. It would be a shame it we have to scrap it, the school and I have dedicated the time slot and can’t really make it up if it falls through.  I know time/money/logistics are all a concern for all of us. But I often get requests “When are you coming to X,Y, Z?” – I only get to come if we get students. I won’t harp about it again, just one last nudge if you know someone out that way, or wanting to visit out that way…dates are April 22-26 for the joinery class, and the 27th & 28th for the carving   http://www.ptwoodschool.com/Home.html  

 

I have 2 more days to prep for my lecture/demos at the Winterthur Furniture Forum… http://www.winterthur.org/?p=976  that’s what all the rosewood is about! 

 

Two spaces left at Country Workshops’ box class August 2013

meet me in the country

Drew Langsner tells me there’s two spaces left for this summer’s box-carving class at Country Workshops. Once these two are filled, there is no second chance for this class in this spot – so if you’re thinking about having a great time down in the western North Carolina mountains, think faster…Then get a hold of Drew at http://countryworkshops.org/

see this post, http://pfollansbee.wordpress.com/2013/01/16/may-be-the-last-time-i-dont-know/

here’s more http://pfollansbee.wordpress.com/2012/11/13/how-did-i-get-started-country-workshops-the-langsners-is-how/

I know there’s many obstacles; money, time, logistics…but you will have a great time if you come. It’s about more than making a box & carving. It’s truly an immersion experience. My life changed because of my time spent at Drew & Louise’s place. It’s that simple. 

 

 

This ain’t green woodworking

applied turnings, Boston, 17th c

This ain’t green woodworking. These applied turnings are on a chest of drawers from Boston, c. 1630s-1690s. I’m making some for a chest loosely based on the originals; the Boston joiners also used these turnings on cupboards, cabinets and joined chests, Some of them are “exotics” i.e. imported timbers from the Caribbean and other faraway places. I’ve seen rosewood and ebony used for these, I think. My notes are somewhere. (Or check American Furniture 2010 for an article I did with Robert Trent about the Boston joinery tradition – “Re-assessing the London Style Joinery and Turning of Seventeenth-Century Boston”) Often  these turnings are done in local maple instead. 

When I run across a straight-grained section of maple in the firewood pile, I split some out and save it for a time like this. The maple I’m working here was riven from green stock a long time ago, rough-planed, and stored in the shop until needed. Which is now.

riven and planed maple

I decided to practice on maple, and make my mistakes on that. The final ones will be in rosewood. Also not green woodworking.

The premise I operate on is that these turnings are made by gluing up two blanks with a thin piece between them. The function of this sacrificial piece is to prevent the points of the pole lathe from wedging the glued-up stock apart. Everyone I know who has made these used an electric lathe, with various types of drive centers/dead centers. If I just glue the two maple pieces together, the points of my lathe will, when tightened, wedge them apart. Not good. So here you see them centered on the oak strip, not bearing on the glue joint. 

lathe points on center strip of turning

So here’s what it looks like in stages. I true up the maple bits, these need to be dead-flat so you can glue them together. Likewise, make the center strip, In my shop, it’s usually oak. Hide glue is used to make a sandwich out of them.

ready to glue

Scribe the diameter on the end grain.

circle scribed on end grain

Next, I plane chamfers on the corners to get them nearly octagonal.

chamfers

Then turn them. I have good photos of the originals, but I never measured their details. I have a good idea of the scale, so I am working out my proportions in the wood. I turned one pair and knew they were wrong – but I finished them anyway, so I could use them as a guide for the next pair.

roughing gouge

shaping w skew The 2nd set came out better. By “better”

Here are both turnings. The bottom one is first. Too much taper, too exaggerated.   I find I have to get them off the lathe sometimes to see their shapes more clearly. I photographed them against the window and this showed me the details clearly. The second set is closer to the shapes in the originals. 

 

On the 2nd one, (top in photo) I almost had it just the way I wanted it,  the vase/cup near the top has its greater diameter too low, its widest point should be right near its top rim. So I put it back & trimmed it some. It’s overall too thick, next one will be more slender. But its proportions are what I am after. 

done

 

I have some Bolivian rosewood to work on next.

next blank is Bolivian Rosewood

For planing that, I used this toothing plane that I got in the Alexander hoard.

toothing plane iron

But this is not true rosewood, from the family Dalbergia. I have some East Indian rosewood on the way…need gloves for that stuff. Maybe a mask…

 

PS: here’s where I learned all I know about toothing planes - http://anthonyhaycabinetmaker.wordpress.com/2011/01/29/the-toothing-plane-a-tool-of-our-time/

 

a good day…

Morning: we’ve had eagles around for the past week-plus. Since the blizzard. But I hadn’t got any good photos yet. 

 

then, afternoon: a saw-whet owl. I had never seen one before. 

 

Not a bad day. 

 

 

17th-c joinery & carving at Port Townsend School of Woodworking

Workshops and classes take a lot of planning; and it seems now that schedules are planned further ahead than ever before. I have been asked about summer of 2014 already…

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. If I am to get out west, (real west, not Connecticut) then it’s time to get cracking. I have two classes planned at the Port Townsend School of Woodworking.  http://www.ptwoodschool.com/Home.html  I’m really looking forward to getting out there, and meeting Tim Lawson, Jim Tolpin and others…But…I need students to make it happen. So, if you are out left, and want to learn some funny, old-timey joinery and carving – it’s time to get to it. If I am to see some western birds, then let’s get serious. 

joined stool, chamfered not turned

Port Townsend WA

http://www.ptwoodschool.com/2013_woodworking_schedule.html

http://www.ptwoodschool.com/joint_stool_from_a_tree.html

http://www.ptwoodschool.com/17th_century_carved_panel.html

The dates are April 22-26 for the joined stool class, and the following weekend for 2 days of carving, April 27-28.

opposing lunettes

carving underway

reproduction 17th-century furniture

 

Will I see you there? 

To read more about the school, here’s what Schwarz said some time ago, http://www.popularwoodworking.com/article/woodworking-at-the-end-of-the-world

 

stopped by work today…lots to do when I get back tomorrow. We went to pick up some spoon wood, but this was too big for me today. It’s a catalpa, said to have ants in it, I’ll cut some tomorrow & see. 

 

catalpa

then, we saw two or three eagles – I got terrible photos, but these were my first real views of the winter for these birds.  These are lousy views, but we got pretty close to a juvy later back near the shop…he got close to us I should say…

 

Then we found a few cherry trees down, this was the biggest. Bowls and spoons I say. 

cherry

 

The kids were more interested in the sheep, who seemed to be interested in nothing at all. 

 

 

strapwork carving designs

Sometimes I buy two copies of a book on purpose, other times it’s because I can’t find it, buy the replacement and then later find the first. So a while back I sent George Walker http://georgewalkerdesign.wordpress.com/ a copy of the 1981 journal “Furniture History” because it has an article by Anthony Wells-Cole about the “strapwork” design found on oak furniture in Devon, England and Ipswich, Massachusetts from the seventeenth century. Wells-Cole ran down the existing work in oak, then looked at possible sources for it, including stone monuments and print sources. The article is titled “An Oak Bed at Montacute: A Study in Mannerist Decoration.”

Hans Vredeman de Vries, 16th c

I’ve been prepping lately for my now-postponed carving class, so had the chance to review a lot of photos of various carving patterns. The strapwork one in the Wells-Cole study in particular always fascinates me. I have carved it umpteen times. Never the same twice.

Based on markings still visible on the old ones, one method for layout seems to be horizontal and vertical centerlines, then spacing things outward from there in four directions according to the size of the timber, and the size & shape of the tools.

carved box, Thomas Dennis, 1660s-1700, Ipswich, Massachusetts

 

this next box has an abandoned layout partially struck on its inner face of the front board. I always get excited by this sort of evidence, march off & adopt it at my bench, then I pull up and think, “wait a minute, this is a mistake – that’s why it’s not done!”

I usually work outwards from the center, and most often start with a circle there, then the bands/straps working east/west/north/south.

PF in process

adding leaves inside the strapwork

This time, I marked the pattern left and right, but only on the top half of the board. Then it’s easy enough to copy from there to the bottom half. Then remove the background. 

the second half

removing background

Depending on a number of factors, one of which might be whim, you can make the curved straps that run along the top and bottom margins either broad and shallow, or taller and tighter. Once you learn the vocabulary, you can combine these parts in a streaming run of designs, never to be repeated…

Here’s broad & shallow:

versus taller and tighter:

Those are both the same maker, Thomas Dennis again. Here’s more variations:

 

Then, don’t forget this one: http://pfollansbee.wordpress.com/2010/03/04/thomas-dennis-eat-your-heart-out-this-is-oak-furniture/

(The photos in tonight’s post run the gamut from my own, others from Trent, Rob Tarule, and a couple clipped from books. thanks to all…)

 

 

re-scheduled carving class

reproduction 17th-century furniture

If you live near this part of the world, then maybe you know we are about to get some snowfall that will keep most of us at home. Ain’t no place I’d rather be…

BUT I did have a 2-day workshops scheduled this weekend at the Connecticut Valley School of Woodworking in Manchester, CT. So Bob Van Dyke called the other day & we found that we can both swing it next weekend.

So, Feb 16th & 17th it is. Here’s the link to Bob’s page about the weekend classes… http://www.schoolofwoodworking.com/woodworking-classes.html#Speciality_Weekend_Classes