Thuja Custom Furniture

Two New Planes

2012-01-08T22:13:00.000-05:00

Two new planes are now in my arsenal! One purchased and one homemade:

The Lee Valley small rebate plane is my first Veritas tool and I'm pretty happy with it so far. Nice adjustments and comfortable in the hand with an O1 blade for easy sharpening!

The second is a small chamfer plane made from quartered beech. The guide fence is built into the bottom of the plane and without a second adjustable guide fence requires a careful approach, something that isn't always a bad thing. I saw this style in a Japanese plane and liked the simplicity. Japanese tools have a wonderful simplicity that demands respect and understanding, care and attention to get the best results out of them. They serve as a stark contrast to the western planes like the Veritas where features abound and adjustments are just a thumbscrew away. I guess it's something like the difference between an artist and a technician. It's funny because in the cycling world Shimano is the technician's choice, while Campagnolo is for the artists...

My Fading Youth

2011-11-28T22:36:00.001-05:00

This summer I asked my friend Nik to take some shots of me on my bike while I was still young and vibrant in the declining years of my 20's. I think the pictures turned out great (at least the ones where I don't look like a big fatso...). They'll be something to harp back to when I get old..."I used to have good calves...Honest!". The pics were taken at Rattlesnake Point near Milton, one of the only places you'll find actual switchbacks in Southern Ontario. The pictures also showcase my new ride, a De Rosa Neo Primato. Handmade in Italy, the frame is a classic steel beauty standing out in a world ever obsessed with aero profiles and carbon layups.

A New Lamp

2011-11-21T21:52:00.001-05:00

I've always enjoyed making lamps and the offcuts from other projects seem to always have the right curve or shape to inspire me. I also just got a dowel cutter and that needed a test run so someone is getting a lamp for christmas!

The screen is made from mylar, which has a great translucence and structural rigidity you can't get with a paper screen.

Sho Brush

2011-10-21T00:55:00.000-04:00

The selection of high quality Japanese calligraphy brushes is somewhat lacking in Waterloo it seems, so I decided to give a go at making my own. There are two types of hair used in brushes, with the badger hair being a stiffer brush (which I seem to prefer). I use a badger brush to foam up when I'm shaving, so I bought one of those brushes as a source for my bristles and then planed and drilled and glued up what you see below. It has a semi-octagonal barrel, which is my nod to the appreciation of imperfection in Japanese design. It was also a project that didn't involve any power tools, which is always a nice thing!

So far I'm pretty happy with it. The hairs are much stiffer than the ones in the cheap badger hair brush I had in my collection and the flow of ink seems to be more controllable too. Let's see how it works in the long run once it gets broken in a bit. I'm interested to see what my calligraphy teacher is going to think once she gets back from Japan!

初心 - Shoshin - Beginner's Mind

2011-10-03T23:16:00.000-04:00

Shunryu Suzuki's collection of Zen thought was an "enlightening" read....get it...."enlightening"....

With recent years of my life spent at least partially as a teacher I found some ideas I liked a lot:

You have a teacher for yourself, not for the teacher.

There should not be any particular teaching. Teaching is in each moment in every existence. That is the true teaching.

In the beginner's mind there are many possibillities; in the expert's mind there are few.

Zazen, or the practice of meditation that most people think of when they think of Zen Buddhism, is in my inexperienced and uneducated understanding a path to calmness, oneness, and enlightenment.

For me zazen is found on my bicycle.

Belgian Shots

2011-07-10T18:56:00.000-04:00

Here are some initial shots from my time cycling through the Flemish part of Belgium:

Charles Yu

2011-07-02T04:19:00.000-04:00

"The only free man," he would say, "is one who doesn't work for anyone else." In later years, that became his thing, expounding on the tragedy of modern science fictional man: the desk job. The work week was a structure, a grid, a matrix that held him in place, a path through time, the shortest distance between birth and death.
- Charles Yu - how to live safely in a science fictional universe

Finding something, or more accurately, not finding something seems to be a consistent theme of Charles Yu's writing. Most of the time it's not even clear what Man, 35, is looking for in Yu's stories. There is a vague concept or emotion perhaps, and it is this quest of Man, 35, that is so identifiable, so ingenious, so obvious, but is so difficult to express. The search is often complicated by Man, 35,'s analytical mindset; a viewpoint that demands connections, diagrams, and equations to explain his existence. Man, 35, knows all too well that these tools of research won't help him one bit, but he has nothing else and insistently hammers away with the same approach he would use to solve partial differential equations. Ironically, just like these PDE's, an analytic solution is usually impossible due to the complexity of the problem. The best we can hope for is a numerical approximation of the answer. A numerical approximation of longing; of contempt; of a thousand different emotions. Would Man, 35, give up his world of complex domains and eigenvalue problems to understand these things? Does he have to?

Maybe Man, 35,'s mindset isn't the problem. Maybe he just needs a new perspective, a new method. A Feynman diagram for Love, Hope, Despair, and Regret.

When I get old...

2011-04-14T11:50:00.002-04:00

I put in my time this afternoon and then, when I was done and entirely frustrated and sick of my computer screen, I went for a ride. This was a funny ride, because I did two things: I went faster than I have ever gone by myself over a significant distance (36kph average over 65km), and I thought about some things. Usually the two don't go hand in hand, but today they did. When I lugged my bike on my shoulder through the front door John took a look at me and said "Wow Matt, you must have been going really hard, you look spent". Then I sat on my front steps in my bike shorts with my shirt off drinking my water bottle until I stopped sweating. For whatever reason there were about 50 little birds fluttering around pecking at the ground and tearing off pieces of grass. Sometimes little fights would break out over a prized bug or a stick that might find a useful role in building a nest. I wrote some code to imitate birds flocking in flight last year, and that always makes me think about the dynamics of riding in a group of cyclists and the amazement of the swirling coordination of 50 sparrows being scared into flight by a passing car. Something else I thought about was the fear I find pleasure in when I ride my bike. Three motorcycles roared past me tonight, and to be honest I've never really understood motorcycles, but I imagine that at least part of the reason people sit on a piece of metal they can send flying across a skinny slab of asphalt at 200+ km/h is that they enjoy being afraid, and finding the strength to withstand that fear and rev their engine another few thousand rpm's, launching their consciousness at ever more insane velocities (that was a long sentence). For me, riding a bike is not about the magnitude of the speed; only occasionally will you get up to 80km/h or better, and that's usually after spending an hour climbing up a mountain going 15 km/h. So it's not the speed I'm afraid of; it's not being able to make it, just being shattered and falling off the pedals without any more energy to turn the gears another inch. Maybe that's too dramatic, but every time I go out on my bike there seems to be a point where I ask myself to keep going when my legs are just screaming and feel like they're ready to explode. Fear probably isn't the right word, but something like it, maybe it's just the voice or Fear telling me to quit. I have to try my best to block it out, but I'm not always successful. Tonight I was though, every time I asked my body to get out of the saddle I did. Whenever I could click into a bigger gear and push my legs a little harder, I did. I measured my resting heart rate the other day and it was 43 bpm, which is apparently pretty low and means that my heart is pretty strong. When I have to stop at a traffic light after riding for a while my heart feels like it's going to shake my body apart. There are days when I look down at my legs and I don't know how I got to this strange place where I'm pushing myself the way that I do. I look down and think that those aren't my legs, that's not my bike, that's not the asphalt ripping past underneath it all. The last hard section of road on my ride tonight heads east, and with the sun setting over my shoulder, my shadow was dancing ahead of me as I climbed up the final few hills. Tonight I didn't feel disconnected or out of place, the dark outline draped on the road was me, this was my bike, those were my legs, and I wasn't listening to Fear whispering in my ear.

What I actually do for a living...

2011-04-01T20:37:00.004-04:00

Sometimes I think people don't really get what I do. Piano research...but what does that mean?Well, it means I do things like carefully measure and tape up a guitar so I can do modal analysis, a technique that lets us see how an object vibrates at different frequencies. It also means I spend a lot of time writing programs to analyze sound and create maps of those sounds so we can compare two different instruments. I do all of this in my piano lab...a room full of computers, accelerometers, and a big old grand piano. A lot of my time is spent thinking about things after they've been transformed to a new domain, something that makes you think differently about the world we live in.

Above is what a piano sounds like, and below is what a guitar sounds like...

I've also been teaching this term, filling in for a prof who is on sabbatical. To say the least teaching a class of 90 second year engineering students has been an experience...The course was about social factors in design. A lot of singing and dancing in front of a presentation screen, but overall a good experience.

Beech; a good wood.

2011-02-26T21:35:00.003-05:00

Beech, in my books, is an underrated wood. It doesn't cost a lot, it's not all that flashy, but it has that kind of simple beauty I seem to prefer. The above picture is a beech coffee table that is 3/4's finished. I've also got a desk, a chair, and a side table in mind...maybe after all of that I'll be in beech overload! I've also been thinking about making a plane or two that I might add to my arsenal...

Drawing Things...with a PENCIL!!!

2011-01-21T23:26:00.003-05:00

I saw a neat table by Tomoko Azumi that uses a semi-Japanese joint (it's not really super traditional or super functional, but nice nonetheless) to join the skirt and legs of a table together. It's basically a 3 member joint, with the curveball that the legs are titled at a slight angle. I drew it up in Sketchup to let the computer do the hard math, but while dimensioning it I wasn't happy with the visual appearance of the drawing I'd have to work with to actually layout and cut the joints. I redrew it, which you see above, and I kind of liked the process of trying to get my head around what is hidden, what is visible, and where things are pretty much the same, but not quite the same. Overall a good experience and a good chance to get off the computer and do some designing in the real world. I kind of like the drawing too...it's got something nice about it going on...

Sharp

2011-01-04T23:06:00.003-05:00

I'm back at it again....finally. After a BUSY term in my PhD and the Christmas rush I'm finally going to get back to doing some woodworking. Before you can do any woodworking though you have to first do your sharpening. I'm still developing my sharpening skills, but the back of my hand is missing some hair right now, so my blades are getting razor sharp at least.

The Boom

2010-11-03T12:01:00.002-04:00

I'd say it's pretty fair to say that Waterloo is in the middle of a construction boom with a number of large building projects related to the universities and the development of more vertical density in the downtown (uptown) core. Everywhere you turn it seems there is a crane and a construction site overrun with pickup trucks, construction waste, and men in hardhats. Sometimes I just feel like going to live in the woods...

I think Hollerado offers a good thought in the line "Do you do the doot da doot do?". My taoist inclinations make me think about doot da doot doing a bit more these days.

I leica my panasonic...

2010-10-30T20:19:00.004-04:00

I just got a new digital camera, a Panasonic LX-3 which has a lovely Leica lens in it. This camera is supposed to bring the best of SLR to the compact digital world and so far I'm pretty impressed. It has full manual control and some pretty advanced features. A good lens also makes big difference and this Leica seems pretty good. I used to be happy with little Canon, but after seeing the images it brings me closer to my SLR film camera. This camera also shoots in a 16:9 ratio which I like so far. Anyways here are some pics from a grey October afternoon:

Revisited

2010-08-28T17:29:00.003-04:00

I had built this coffee table about a year ago, and it was neat to see it again.

It's sort of nice to see your work still vibrantly existing in the universe. It was a special piece of wood and a nice thing to see it still looking great.

Stability and Accuracy

2010-08-10T13:17:00.004-04:00

I had just finished reading a book about Japanese carpentry and roof construction when I took a closer look at a new building being built in Waterloo. The book is called "The Genius of Japanese Carpentry", and details the reconstruction of a Japanese shrine from the ground up. It focuses on one building and shows the detail and extreme accuracy involved in building a roof structure that will last for centuries.

The curve of the above roof is approximated by 5 pieces of lumber, they look like 2x10's from the ground, that for some reason shocks me. The 5 pieces aren't even evenly spaced, there are three 12' pieces followed by a short 4' piece then another 12'er...I'm pretty sure that wouldn't fly with the master carpenter in Japan...

..and in other exciting news...dimensional instability in wood is a BIG deal! A lovely exaggeration of this was found in my garage, where two identical pieces of wood do a nice job of showing what happens when one is saturated with water and the other isn't. Just another reminder to pay attention to grain direction and dimensional change!

Sprints

2010-07-18T23:33:00.008-04:00

Cyclists know what a town sign signifies, a time to throw it into your big ring and hammer to the line in the hopes of winning the sprint finish into a sprawling metropolis like Wellesley, Crosshill, or Lisbon. I'm thinking of doing a series of these town signs, rural Ontario sort of has a hold on me it seems...

I also found this nicely balanced farm on a dirt road I usually use to avoid the highway. There's a nice little gravel climb at the end, and at the top there's this farm.

Sketching

2010-07-01T15:10:00.002-04:00

Here are a couple of sketches I did in and around Galt for the sketching course I'm taking. Everything is done with ballpoint pen, something I didn't really like at first, but is now growing on me.

Black and White

2010-06-07T21:57:00.005-04:00

Of late I've been trying to improve my sketching, which means I've been down in Galt at the architecture school taking a course with some MArch students.Three hours a week you can find me out in the sunshine doodling some buildings with a ballpoint and a 7x10 pad. At first I was somewhat put off by the idea of using a cheap old ballpoint, but it is actually revealing itself to be quite the handy tool. As a side project I've been spending some time developing my B&W photo skills (get it...developing) in the architecture school's dark room. Thanks to the great help I've gotten there I can now develop my own film and make my own prints. The shot above is my Spears smoother plane, a great tool...and a pretty good photograph.

Sitting Rethought

2010-06-01T10:52:00.006-04:00

My latest adventure is working on a chair design for an Italian furniture maker, Lago, which I can't really talk about...but what I can talk about is a cool book I found while developing the chair for Lago. The book is titled Rethinking Sitting, and is written by Peter Opsvik. Opsvik is a famous Norwegian designer that created objects like this:

In the book he basically explores the notion of sitting as being somewhat unnatural for human beings as primates. We should be swinging in a tree or balancing on a branch that is swaying in the wind. Instead of this we have adopted very static chair designs that have us rigidly positioned for hours on end. Introducing the idea of multiple positions, flexibility, and balance makes chairs more enjoyable as we transform their static nature into something more dynamic.

The point that got through to me the most was when Opsvik was talking about the somewhat ingrained importance of constantly shifting our balance. Opsvik argues that you would never stand against a wall in one rigid position for extended periods, instead we shift our weight, shuffle our feet, and generally just wiggle. The lack of movement makes the rigid standing position against the wall unnatural and painful. Our muscles didn't evolve to be constrained, they were meant to be used, to be active and dynamic. Sitting still is against our human nature it would seem (kids never seem to sit still, do they?)...

So with this idea in mind I'm starting to think a little bit differently about sitting. Maybe there are other things we should be rethinking too...

Ey

2010-05-13T03:43:00.002-04:00

My time here in France is just wrapping up, but I'm still coming across some incredibly beautiful landscapes. The Col d'Ey isn't the world's biggest or hardest climb, but the views are just wonderful. I know that I'm a cycling nut, but there is just no better way to experience a country than on a bike.

Bears (or any quadruped really)

2010-05-05T07:54:00.003-04:00

I was thinking about design and the idea of what makes an object really something special. It's somewhat obvious that some people are more critical when examining objects than others, but it's always surprising to me to hear someone complement a piece of furniture that I look at crookedly because of its poor workmanship or strange proportions. Does art or design really play an important role in our lives as a source of enrichment, or are we as a society so choked with cheap chipboard crap that any solid-wood piece of furniture automatically becomes worthy of esteem...sometimes it seems that way to me, but maybe I'm not generous enough to the idea of subjectivity and personal taste.

I don't claim to be a great photographer, but when I take a picture I put effort into its composition. I turn on a light, I make sure I walk the extra ten feet so the power lines aren't in the shot, I adjust my film speed, waste a few frames, check to see if things are centered, turn the object around to get the best angle. Composition is something I think a lot of people who don't actively "create" don't worry about, or maybe they just don't understand it. For me composition is the hardest part of furniture building, but that's not to say that the skill needed in construction is something I've mastered, just that composition is really hard.

Here's a table I drew up while thinking about the way that a bear lumbers along a path in the woods. All the legs should be tapered, but really what I was trying to convey with this sketch is a sense of motion...

Black and White

2010-04-30T15:16:00.005-04:00

I've been working a bit on my creative skills while I've been here in France, some sketching and some photography. I had picked up a cheap $80 SLR camera (which used to cost $600 before the digital revolution) and I've been taking some black and white (or noir et blanc) shots. Poorly digitized, here are six of my favourites so far:

Even more shots can be found on my france2010 website.

Top and Bottom

2010-04-26T15:23:00.009-04:00

From the top:

From the bottom:

Mont Ventoux is referred to as the bald giant of Provence and is quite the place. At 1909m it's not the tallest mountain, but it's history in the Tour makes it one of the magical cycling places on this planet. I had a funny conversation the other day with this old French guy in the village we're staying in about bikes...I was wearing my pink jersey and we were about to head off when he comes up and starts asking us about our bikes... Aluminum? Carbon?...He picks mine up to judge the weight (I think he was disappointed by my 20lb aluminum beast)...I can sort of understand him, but his French seems pretty flavoured with the local Provencal twang...then he asks me how many km's I've put in this year, but I haven't had a computer for a while so I just point to where my computer would be and he understands...then he says you don't need a computer you just need your heart (while pounding his chest)...he wishes us good luck and we head out...that was pretty cool.

I took some pictures with my 35mm film camera at the top of the mountain in black and white...they're at the photomat now, but I think there'll be a couple great shots in there.

Welcome to France

2010-04-20T15:14:00.004-04:00

France is a great country, something I learned while driving halfway across it due to the Volcano eruption that made me rebook my flight through Barcelona. I'm staying near a medieval village, Vaison la Romaine, a suitably named Roman era town with a nice market and some great history. I'm hoping to do some sketching and work a bit on my proportions, something the Romans were experts at....I'm not real big on Classical design in general, but you have to appreciate the way they lay out their geometry! I've been reading George Walker's blogand he's real big on that kind of stuff...

We got a real nice haul from the market today, some fresh cheese, an old cave aged mountain cheese, heirloom tomatoes (which are gorgeous from a pure aesthetics standpoint) and some delicious Provencal olives.

My French is coming back to me little by little, we'll see how I am after a month!

Kanna

2010-03-19T20:48:00.005-04:00

My first kanna arrived today all the way from Japan:

I don't know what this says:

...but the dai is a nice quarter sawn piece of oak...

...this says the same thing as the box, which I'm guessing is "katsusaburo", the name of the plane..

...overall a neat thing, but due to some humidity issues (or lack thereof) I'm still waiting to get to use it. You see the blade is stuck and I can't get it out to make the modifications needed to the dai that are required for a new kanna. I think that traveling from humid Japan to the dry Canadian winter of Ontario has caused the block to dry out and shrink quite a bit and lock the blade in place.

Engineers.......

2010-03-17T16:09:00.006-04:00

Last week I got the chance to give a lecture to a class I'm TAing at the University of Waterloo. The course is based around social design factors and is meant to be a course that helps expand the engineering students' perspective about the design process. Here's a link to my slides:

Craft, Design, and the Engineer

A little Nakashima, a little Lago, and some Sam Maloof for good measure...getting the opportunity to talk about these things was nice because it gave me a chance to think about how the design of something as simple as a chair can be really quite a complex thing. Some of the students really seemed to appreciate what I was talking about...that was really rewarding.

Get a Handle on It!

2010-02-27T16:33:00.004-05:00

I've started on a handled smoothing plane made out of ziricote...I've just got the handle roughed out, but I'm looking forward to working a bit more on it. I've said it before, but ziricote is a bizarre wood to work.

On a completely different topic I was thinking about how weird it is to have your work evaluated by people. For the past year or so I've had a coffee table on display at a cafe that I frequent pretty regularly, and it's kind of a strange experience to hide behind a coffee and hear people talk candidly about your work without them realizing you're person who made the thing they're talking about. Most of the time people seem to like my work, or even really like it, but I've definitely had a couple of bad reviews too. Selling craft is hard, real hard. It's definitely something I need to work on.

ABC's

2010-02-15T20:36:00.005-05:00

So I've decided to try to learn some Japanese. To be honest, all of those "character" languages have kind of scared me as a roman alphabet user, but apparently the Japanese have sort of combined the best of both worlds. Although they do use some pictograms, where one character basically means an entire word, for the most part their language is syllabic with syllagrams for the limited number of syllables in their language. According to the book I'm reading there are about 110 basic sounds in Japanese, versus about 8000 in English, which also makes things a lot easier to wrap your head around.

The characters at the top of this post represent the basic vowel sounds, and also my attempt to start learning the hiragana character set. This is the equivalent of a little kid learning how to print, and is a humbling experience. It's on to the consonantish sounds tomorrow and trying to imprint the strokes into my brain.

Thanks for the show!

2010-02-07T20:43:00.003-05:00

We had our show today, Three F's, and it was a great success. Thanks to everyone who came out and thanks to Nik and Adam for showing their work with me. An extra special thanks to the fine folks at Sablétine fine pastries for hosting us.

KW-WCC

2010-01-21T20:31:00.003-05:00

So I'm sharpening in my kitchen these days, not the greatest set up, but it gets the job done. I'm sharpening because I'm now back to working, this time out of the KW-WCC. The KW Woodworking and Craft Centre is quite the place, a whole bunch of great equipment and a whole bunch of old guys whose wives want them out of the house. If you need a place to work in Waterloo I'd definitely recommend it.

A New Show - Three F's

2010-01-12T21:46:00.004-05:00

There's a new show coming up featuring the work of me and a couple of my friends. There will be great photographs, fantastic fashion, and some nice furniture. It will all weave together with the themes of wood and destruction.

Reception and show are from 2-5pm, Sunday February 7th, at Sabletine Fine Pastries, 203 King St. S., Waterloo ON.

Come out, bring your friends, and come see some great local art and craft!

Sayonara Workshop

2009-12-30T22:19:00.002-05:00

I found this beauty while cleaning out my workshop at the Globe Studios. It's funny what makes me excited these days...but anyways, I've got all my stuff out and it's a bit of a sad day. It was a nice thing to have a place to go where you could just bang on something or take a couple passes with a plane...a good creative space.

Now it's back to school in January and a bit more of a focus on research. I'm joining the KW Craft center, so my woodworking days certainly aren't behind me, but I'll be doing things at a much more relaxed pace.

Hammer Time

2009-12-10T23:03:00.002-05:00

Mallets are something I like to make. Here's a little kanna tapper...now I just need to get a real kanna!

Mitred

2009-11-22T21:53:00.004-05:00

The Globe fall sale wrapped up this afternoon and was a great success. Thanks to everyone who came by and checked out my work, and an extra thanks to those who picked up one of my pieces!

Before the show I finished up one of the few remaining planes that was missing from my arsenal...a mitre plane!

A mitre plane is usually used with a shooting board and makes the job of squaring up your boards a whole lot easier! The body lacks the sexy curves of a smoother, but the blockiness lets it be used on its side. This one is made from ipe and quartersawn maple, and I think that ipe is a wood I'll use again in my planes.

I've rounded over the edges to make it a good fit in my right hand and so far it has worked extremely well. I also used a new wedge design that is a trade secret right now. I applied some of that knowledge I gained from my engineering days and I think I've come up with a simple, but great approach. Somebody probably already beat me to it, but I'll claim it as my own for now.

Right now it's sharing a Hock blade with my high-angle smoother and like my other Hock blades it works great. High carbon O1 blades from Hock have lived up to their reputation and I'd recommend them to anybody.

End of the line...and the Globe Fall Sale - November 20-22

2009-11-10T20:46:00.003-05:00

So I've come to the decision to close down my workshop at the Globe Studios. It's a great place and I'm sad to have to let it go, but I'm low on funds and time, so life will have to rumble on. My PhD has me spending time in labs doing things like motion tracking (seen below) and computer modeling, and this means I've been stretching myself thin.

I'll be working out of Globe until the end of December, so I hope to put on one more show sometime in January with the work I complete between now and then. I think it will mostly consist of lighting, and hopefully some fashion from a friend of mine (that is still TBD). There's also the Globe fall sale coming up on November 20, 21, and 22. I'll have a couple coffee tables and some lamps for sale, including this curvaceous beauty:

High Angle Smoother and a Little Bit of Music

2009-10-29T21:12:00.005-04:00

I've been holding onto a Hock blade that I bought a couple weeks ago and I finally got it into a plane. This is a high angle smoother, bedded at about 58º, and is used for cleaning up those really nasty grains you find around knots and places with a lot of figure.

The sole of the plane is jatoba, with a quartered maple centre, and ziricote sides. I had never worked with ziricote before and to say it's a strange wood would be an understatement. It's got the most amazing grain that seems to weave in and out and it just turns into a cloud of dust when you cut it with a saw.

This plane didn't come out quite right the first few times...but after sticking to it I'm quite happy with the final results.

I also just finished up a music stand. It features some great birsdeye and curly maple that you have to see to believe.

The angle adjustment gave me a little problem, but in the end I figured out that I needed to add some felt in there to make it work right. Building things you've never built before is a neat challenge...a good way to stretch your brain and make some mistakes.

The height adjustment was also a bit of a head scratcher, but in the end it came out great, both visually and functionally.

Show Pictures

2009-10-24T21:35:00.004-04:00

Sam...

George...

...and James...

So the show went real well last night. My friend Peter did the three great drawings of Sam Maloof, George Nakashima, and James Krenov that you can see above and I had some new pieces as well. The table below came from my friend Mohrgan's tree and is a fabulous bookmatched set from a crotch of his Maple tree.

I'm getting my head around the butterfly joint and I'm getting confident in making them nice and tight. I used some Jatoba for the butterflies and I really like the colour match with the maple. Speaking of colour, the Padauk desk seen below came out really well.

Padauk is a wood most people don't know about and it's funny how many people asked me how I stained the top to get it that colour. Stain is not really something I use very often (or ever really) and it's funny to see the perplexed look on peoples' faces when I tell them that that's what the real colour is. So all in all a good night, and a special thanks to all of you who made it out!

Show On Friday

2009-10-20T21:04:00.002-04:00

Come on down Friday for a great show featuring my friend Peter and me.

Maple

2009-10-06T17:46:00.003-04:00

I'm always amazed by maple. For one tree to grow with such variation just sort of blows my mind. Here is some curly and birdseye maple that I'm using in a music stand, it should turn out great (as long as I sharpen my planes)...

...and a better picture of a walnut bench I've been working on. This piece was the centre slab from the tree and was basically cracked all the way down the slab. I put the crack back together and got to include some butterfly joints to boot.

Show Details

2009-10-03T21:46:00.002-04:00

So here's the official poster for the show I'm putting together with my friend Peter...

If you're free and can make it out it should be a good time. Like I say, at the very least there will be cake! That's a good thing!

Now for a completely different topic...On a recommendation I recently picked up a router plane and I'd have to say I'm liking it a lot so far. Sort of a weird tool that keeps those noisy power tools on the shelf. I used it for the first time to clean out the bottom of the mortises for some butterfly joints and it worked beautifully.

I'm also working on a bench to go with the walnut table I just finished. I'm half done the dovetails, just one more end to go, but I like the way things are turning out.

Plane old Padauk

2009-09-29T20:42:00.004-04:00

There's been a bit of an African invasion in my workshop this week. First of all is the African Blackwood that found its way into a nice little hand plane. I made this plane to take with me places like the lumber yard and the weight of the ABW has really turned it into something special. A real nice little plane that has me thinking about how I can incorporate the ABW into some more hand planes.

The other part of the invasion is this big hunk of Padauk. I'm planning on turning it into a deskand hopefully it should be ready for the show I'm planning for the end of October.

A Show! With Cake!!!

2009-09-24T20:00:00.002-04:00

I've been talking about doing a little show for a while now and I finally got around to booking a space and setting a date. It's going to be on Friday October 23rd, in the evening sometime. Details still need to be sorted out, but I'll be sharing the space with a friend of mine, Peter, who's a painter. It should be an interesting show and at the very least there will be some cake!

Walnut Table Done (mostly)

2009-09-22T19:52:00.003-04:00

...and finally, a fully built, legs on, right-side up table:

Now I just need to put on a couple more coats of oil, take the legs off, move it, and put the legs back on! Simple.

Walnut Side Table

2009-09-20T20:19:00.002-04:00

I finished this walnut side table a couple months ago, but never got a chance to take a good picture. I just sanded it and wiped on some oil so I thought I'd better pull out my camera. Amazing curl and colours in this piece...just wonderful wood.

Levitating Table

2009-09-18T21:42:00.003-04:00

Okay Matt, enough with all the pictures of your Spiers smoother...

...and a new shot of the table with the legs magically attached:

Like a well oiled...

2009-09-16T18:12:00.003-04:00

...walnut table! Well, it's not quite well oiled yet, there's only one coat on, but you really get a great sense of the walnut contrast to the sapwood and the curly maple butterflies. Here's half oil, half no oil:

...and the full monty:

..and a close up of one of the butterflies:

Even More Walnut Table

2009-09-15T21:04:00.003-04:00

I worked on putting in some butterfly joints today and they came out really well. I got to use my "punisher" mallet which was a lot of fun too!

I still need to track down a router plane to help smooth the bottom of my mortises and rabbets, overall I was quite happy with the way the curly maple butterflies turned out.

And here's the wide shot:

Walnut Table Top

2009-09-14T15:30:00.004-04:00

More walnut table top pictures...first the top of the table which I used my smoother to finish.

...and the bottom of the table which I used my sander to finish...

Walnut Table Update

2009-09-10T15:08:00.003-04:00

I've been working on jointing a walnut table and got some good use out of my 5 1/2 Bailey. Sharpening has always been a weak point in my plane skills, but today everything seemed to be working just right.

After all that planing I got a shot that nicely summarized all that hard work. I had already made a new handle for this plane, but I just added the new "knob" after I got a blister the other day. A bit of a different design, but I'm really liking it so far. The plane's now definitely right handed, but it's a lot more comfortable and it fits my hands a lot better. Taking the time to make things fit is definitely worth it.

And here's the table top ready to be glued up with some biscuit joints.

Wonderful Walnut

2009-09-03T21:45:00.002-04:00

I got some great looking walnut slabs in today that will be turned into a dining room table and some benches. These pieces are right from the center of the tree and are just amazingly clear. Wonderful pieces of wood, but they pretty much take up my whole shop ;)

I still need to figure out what pieces go into what things, but I couldn't resist planing down one end of a slab to see how things would turn out.

After a couple minutes with my 5 1/2 and my Spiers (and a rub of tung oil) I wound up with something like this:

Plane Improvisation

2009-09-02T21:03:00.004-04:00

I had picked up this Spiers smoother a couple of months ago and I had only got to use it a little bit. It needed a new blade and I haven't scraped enough money together to get one yet, so today I decided to figure something out with what was in the shop. I had a 3/16" thick, 2 1/4" blade that didn't fit with the Spiers chipbreaker, but since I had success with faking it with a wooden chipbreaker in the jointer plane I just made I thought I'd give it a try. It worked out great and has me thinking about some new plane designs to try in the future.

Pass the Sketchup

2009-08-30T14:03:00.004-04:00

Yesterday I put together the legs for that little table I've been working on and I think it's turning out pretty well. A couple more coats of oil and then I'll paper the kumiko frame and put a piece of glass to act as a table top.

On a completely different note I wanted to describe a setting in Google Sketchup that I Iike. I use sketchup for my CAD because 1) I'm a Mac user and there is approximately zero good Mac CAD software, and 2) It's free! So when you draw things they normally end up looking like this:

Which is nice, but kind of static and too computery, too perfect perhaps. So there's this setting under the styles menu that let's you render the image with a marker, hand-drawn style that looks really, well, hand-drawn.

I don't know what it is exactly, but the marker style just seems a little nicer to me. More fluid, not some rigid computer generated thing. The way you present information is really important, something I keep learning over and over.

Table Planes

2009-08-28T20:00:00.004-04:00

This little kimiko frame is going to turn into a table when all is said and done. Making the asanoha hemp leaf pattern for a second time was a lot more successful. I'm planning to paper the underside and then put a piece of glass on the top. We'll see how it turns out. The contrast between walnut and poplar is something I like a lot.

So I made a new plane as well. It's sort of a franken-plane, made up of a myriad of leftover pieces of wood (there's at least three different pieces of oak and a little padauk). It's longer than my 5 1/2 and is intended to work as a jointer. So far it seems to be working quite well, even though it's super ugly. I think it deserves a rebuild, but conceptually it works!

Another Hammer

2009-08-27T18:14:00.002-04:00

I'm going hammer crazy it seems. Here's another oak mallet that I put together last week. This time I turned the head on my lathe and made a simple handle. The wood is reclaimed oak from the London Winery that I've had kicking around for a couple years now, and is pretty much quarter sawn.

Better Bench Pictures

2009-08-22T19:16:00.001-04:00

Slab Bench

2009-08-21T21:02:00.003-04:00

I'm just about finished this little hallway bench. It features a nice slab of maple and has a drawer that pulls out in the front. I've learned quite a bit about drawers while reading up to build this one. They're quite the complicated thing to build for something that seems so simple. A couple coats of oil and this bench will be out the door. A nice quick project.

If I had a hammer...

2009-08-13T17:29:00.003-04:00

Some days you just feel like hitting things with a really big hammer. My sander and jointer both just bit the dust this week and that meant I wasn't too happy shelling out for parts and wasting my day fixing things. Because of this I built a big Japanese-esque mallet today. The head is quartered oak, with an oak and padauk handle. I got to use my spoke shave to shape the handle, which was really a nice thing to do.

Sometimes I wonder how my personal interpretation of Japanese woodworking relates to the real thing. I'm not too worried about it, I mean I just like building things and they don't have to fit into any tradition or style.

Lamp-o-mania

2009-08-03T19:45:00.002-04:00

Now that I'm back from Italy I'm getting to work in my workshop with some new ideas. I'm currently working on some new lamps, because I really like lamps. The one below is inspired by the construction of a kayak and will use shoji paper for the screen. It's big! I think it's going to be pretty nice though.

I also just finished up this free standing, columnar lamp. It's made of walnut, curly maple, and mylar. I'm thinking that I might try to put together a little show with some more lamps and maybe get a friend of mine to put up some of his paintings.

I really like the heartwood/sapwood contrast of walnut, it's really a nice wood to work with.

Crotch of a Tree

2009-07-01T19:12:00.004-04:00

I finally got around to using one of the crotch pieces of a maple tree my friend had cut down. I've got three more pieces from the same crotch that I'm going to try to turn into a bench and a cabinet.

I also just finished up a clothes rack. Walnut is a great wood that I'm going to try to do more with in the future. It's kind of funny how nice a simple, straight, square piece of wood can look.

Wild Bench

2009-06-29T21:09:00.002-04:00

Here's that bench from last post in it's natural habitat:

Branches and Benches

2009-06-25T21:00:00.003-04:00

I just finished up this cedar bench that will be fitting into a beautiful backyard space.

I've sort of been backlogged lately, but now I'm going to get back to working on some crotch pieces of a maple tree that I've acquired. They are great pieces of wood and should finish up very nicely.

Lathes and Lago

2009-06-20T20:05:00.003-04:00

So here's the great news: I'm going to Italy!!!!!!!

You see there's this cool Italian furniture designer Lago, and they've got a unique design workshop that they run every summer called Lagostudio. You send in a portfolio and if you're lucky enough to be selected you get to go design some things with nine other creative people from all over the world at the Lago mansion near Venice. I'm excited!!!!!!!!!!

In other good news my dad had dropped me off an old lathe a couple weeks ago. I finally got around to get it running and I'm looking forward to learn about wood turning

The first test project on the lathe was a small handle for a prototype piano tuner I'm working on. It turned out pretty well!

Tables and Signs

2009-06-10T13:43:00.005-04:00

I've been getting into woodcarving a little bit lately and I got to practice on a chalkboard sign for my favourite cafe. I basically carve out the letters, brush on some ink, then sand everything down to clean up any ink that's spread over the edge of the letters. It's a pretty easy technique, but I like the rustic look it gives to the lettering. It's obviously handmade, imperfect, and kind of beautiful...just the way I like it.

I've also been working on a table top with that maple tree my friend had cut down last fall. I've been handplaning it and I've gotten to use my new Spiers smoother a bit. It's a great tool, but I've got to get a new blade before it will reach it's full potential. The other item of note was that I hand cut the edges of the table using a ryoba handsaw, which was an interesting experience to say the least. I never thought of wax as a necessary item in a woodshop, but now I'm waxing my planes, my saws, and just about anything else that moves!

Centerfolds

2009-05-31T00:35:00.006-04:00

So I was putting together a portfolio last week and that meant I ended up taking a bunch of pictures. I know that I'm a wood nut, but I think tools are pretty cool, so here are some of the better pictures of some of my tools.

Get a Handle on it!

2009-05-16T19:06:00.004-04:00

A couple days ago I noticed that I had broken the handle on my 5 1/2 plane, so I got to work on making a new one. I had always found the old handle to be a little on the small side (which is probably why it broke), so it was a great opportunity to make the plane work better by making it fit my hand better. Now I've got to replace the knob to match the handle!

I also just finished up a set of bookshelves out of poplar and walnut. Poplar is just a great wood.

Shoji

2009-05-03T19:16:00.002-04:00

So we had our show and sale this weekend at the Globe and it all went really well.

Aside from the tables and lamps I had already built I wound up finishing a shoji screen that I was really happy with.

It also features a nice little asanoha inset.

It's a complex piece that takes quite a bit of detail work, but a nice thing to work on.

Spring Show and Sale

2009-04-27T19:16:00.007-04:00

This weekend, May 1-3, there's a great arts event going on at the Globe Studios in Kitchener. It's their spring show and sale and a number of great artists will have works available for purchase. Jewelry, bookbinding, pottery, painting, sculpture, and photography will all be on offer along with some nice woodworking ;)

This is another spalted slab that is now a little coffee table.

The top is just a beautiful piece of wood. It's hard to capture it in a picture, so why not pop down to the Globe on the weekend!

Cleaned Up Good Wood

2009-04-20T20:06:00.005-04:00

So I cleaned up that nice spalted maple slab and it's looking pretty fantastic. It's going to be a bench, but don't worry, those aren't the legs, it's just sitting on my workbench!

These are the the legs!

Curly maple is one of those woods that sort of makes your eyes bug out when you look at it. These pieces of wood are very curly and I think they'll make a great base to the bench. The curl comes from the tree growing in a wavy pattern that when planed causes the light to bounce off and reflect in the striped pattern you see above.

I also just got a whole bunch of poplar today. Poplar in my opinion is quite an under appreciated wood. It can vary in colour from purple to white to green and brown, and it can have streaks and grain patterns that are both unique and beautiful. It's a soft hardwood that works easily and responds well to your saw and chisels. A good wood.

Good Wood and a Little Lamp

2009-04-15T19:17:00.004-04:00

I picked up some nice wood this afternoon and I'm excited to get working on it. First up is a big spalted maple slab. I've got it sitting on my workbench right now and it looks kind of right...

My electric thickness planer is definitely not wide enough to handle it, so it looks like I get to use my hand planes!

I also got some nice walnut slabs that will make some nice coffee tables.

I also just finished up a nice little fir table lamp. I had found this giant 12x4 piece of fir in a factory where I had my old workshop and had been lugging it around for about a year now. It's a beautiful piece of quarter sawn lumber and combined with a shoji paper screen I think it makes a nice little lamp.

Walnut Trees

2009-04-11T19:34:00.003-04:00

I finished up my first project in my new workshop today, a curvaceous walnut lamp. I really liked working with the walnut, a wood that responded well to my planes and my saws.

Shop..ing

2009-04-08T20:16:00.005-04:00

This is my new workshop located at the Globe Studios in Kitchener. I just moved in last weekend and I finally got everything sorted and built and ready to go. I'm starting on some lamps tomorrow and I'm finishing off a little shoji cabinet too.

Respect

2009-04-02T12:52:00.004-04:00

I was having a talk the other day with this old Japanese guy that I know, Junji, and it was kind of interesting. I'm a linguistic nut, so I was asking how to pronounce some of the names of the saws, planes, and chisels I use. When I asked him about the word shokunin (which apparently I was pronouncing like an Italian) he said "I like this word shokunin. It is a good word". As a general rule I'd say I like people who have an opinion about the quality of a word. We talked a bit more about the shokunin and shoji, the famous Japanese paper screens and doors. As a westerner you look at the delicate pieces of wood covered in translucent paper and think, "Man, those must be breaking all time...with kids poking holes in them...what a pain those must be". The first thing Junji says is that "you must respect the door"...I mean, respect for a door...how foreign a concept is that! You know though, I like this idea of respecting a door, and I like the idea of building something in such a way that it requires and deserves your respect. It almost forces you to shift your viewpoint, because if you don't you will end up simply destroying the objects in your world. Kind of like a philosophy lesson in a window screen...

This is a Japanese marking knife. The thing that's so special about it is that it's made from two pieces of steel that are laminated together, one hard, and one soft. The cutting edge is made from the hard steel and allows you to sharpen it until it's like a rasor. The soft steel also has its own purpose, providing strength to support the brittle hard steel. On their own neither would make a good blade, but together this technique produces some of the finest cutting tools available.

Apparently after the Samurai were banned in Japan all the top swordmakers were going to be put out of business, but instead of closing up shop they turned to making plane blades and knives for woodworkers. The knowledge gained over a lifetime of forging is usually passed on from father to son in the blade making world, with the family's secrets and special techniques learned through decades of experience handed down. The shokunin respects the skill of the blade makers by respecting their tools and using them to their full potential.

One day I hope to consider myself a shokunin, but it seems I still have a lot to learn. When my new marking knife arrived in the mail yesterday I immediately set about wrapping the blade with cotton twine to make a handle. Japanese tools seem to require a bit of care and attention, you need to set them up first to make them work the best way that they can for you. While wrapping the knife I got in a rush, stopped being smart, and started being stupid. Instead of clamping the knife down I started yanking on the string with one hand while holding the blade in the other...yup, it slips and I end up sitting in the hospital for 6 hours waiting to get four stitches in my knuckle...

Next time I think I'm going to show that knife a little more respect...

Odate

2009-03-25T14:36:00.003-04:00

I was recently told that this book by Toshio Odate was a good one, so I picked it up and I have to agree. There’s something about the way that Odate writes that displays his passion and ethics without being boastful or over the top. This book is a narrative about the shokunin (a master craftsman and artisan) and their tools and workspace. One of the most interesting things I’ve found is how Odate emphasizes that a shokunin is not just a craftsman, but one with a social consciousness and a certain attitude about their work. Respect and honour seem to be very important parts of everyday life, be it in the sharpening of a blade, or the making of a door. I used to work at a window and door manufacturer in one of my engineering jobs, and looking back now there was definitely something absent in the way that they made doors. When you stamp things out by the hundred each day its very hard for someone to have some kind of moral basis upon which to base their daily efforts.

Okay, before I get too long winded...

I’m definitely a person that learns by doing, and usually that means I screw up the first couple of things I do...well maybe more than a couple. Here’s my take on a simple marking gauge...just a couple wedges really and an old exacto blade, but I’m excited to get to use it.

I’ve started the process of making a lot of my own tools, which will in turn allow me to make better tools, that will then allow me to make even better tools. It’s a neat process to be caught up in.

Sour Patch Kids

2009-03-20T21:46:00.005-04:00

So I went to talk with Kate's cousin Konrad the other day about woodworking, and making stuff, and how this kind of business can make sense in the end, and a bunch of other things.

Konrad makes planes!

Now when Kate told me about her cousin at first I thought he made airplanes, but in fact he makes the kind of handplanes that make woodworkers like me drool.

You can see his work on his website:

www.sauerandsteiner.com/news/

Konrad is a master craftsman, there's no other way to describe what he does. I got the tour of his workshop and even got to use some of his planes, which, to be honest, was a little bit intimidating. They were simply amazing tools, it was just incredible to see how fine the shavings were that they could produce.

The only bad thing is that I have to go back to using my own planes now...once you've had steak...

Trying

2009-03-09T11:19:00.003-04:00

Here's one more plane, this time a trying plane (or a jointing plane). The plane is so long so that you get a lot of registration between the plane and the wood, allowing you to get surfaces perfectly flat.

Roger Rabbit

2009-03-01T17:46:00.004-05:00

Here's another plane, this time a rabbet! Building your own tools is kind of a neat thing. Up next is a jointing plane...I just need to get my hands on some Lignum Vitae!

Chip off the old block...

2009-02-24T20:19:00.003-05:00

A well setup block plane is a wonderful thing. It's a tool that takes some practice and care, one that can you can always get better at using.

I recently picked up some cheap blades from Lee Valley and I'm in the process of making a couple of my own wooden block planes. My first one came out pretty well and I'm excited to get to use it.

Poplar, Joints, and Uwe Senka

2009-02-04T12:52:00.004-05:00

I just finished up a new lamp and some tables. I'm starting to use Japanese paper and I have to say that I'm really enjoying it as a material.

This side table is based on the Fibonacci spiral. Usually I don't like things like this, but I think this table is really nice and simple. One for all the math geeks out there.

Finally, this coffee table is made of poplar and beech. I had never used beech before and I really liked it for this table. After gluing the top together I hand planed it, one of the more challenging skills I'm still working on. The corners have some nice joinery and the bracing underneath takes some inspiration from my guitar building work.

Disposability

2008-11-06T19:59:00.006-05:00

Speaking about the current state of humanity and what is necessary to reengage our global creativity and regain harmony with our planet, George Nakashima said the following:

“It is a difficult movement, a pioneering movement, similar in a way to that experienced by the early English settlers. The movement involves not only beating back the wilderness but also beating back the soulless urban jungles throughout the world.”

- George Nakashima

Nakashima sees the 20th century as an era devoid of great humanity. We have conquered the planet, we have developed incredible technology, and we have lost touch of the simple

values and the sense of community that are truly important.

In our modern society we have embraced the disposable-permanent object. Disposable in the sense that the objects are created for convenience, created to be used once or twice and then thrown away. Permanent in the sense that they will never decay, that in 10 000 years they will still live on perfectly preserved in the garbage dump. As a society we have created a sense of quality defined by permanence that is in direct contradiction to the way the rest of the natural world works. A tree can live for thousands of years, with some standing now that have witnessed the rise of modern man from the early days of the Greeks. When its grand life is finally finished the tree then falls to the ground. It decays and releases all the energy it stored up over its life, it provides a foothold for new trees and nutrients for these new lives to be nourished by.

So how do we design for decay? Is the biodegradable cup I get at the gelato store enough? We’ve been staring at ourselves in the mirror for the past hundred years admiring our drive and ingenuity. It now seems that we’re finally starting to peek around at the world again and are seeing how great we actually are.

Milling

2008-10-30T09:39:00.005-04:00

My friend Mohrgan recently had a maple tree removed from his back yard and decided to get it milled into slabs. The portable bandsaw mill pulled up to his house the other day and we started cutting up his tree on a windy, cold October day. Well Frank, of Franks Planks, actually did all the cutting, but we helped load and push and roll the logs and finished lumber around his front yard. It took about a day to get everything cut and he got a lot of great wood.

For helping him out he's going to give me 4 slabs that we cut from the crotch of the tree. They should provide for some opportunity for incredible results.

I've also got my eye on some more of his large slabs that would be perfect for desks, benches or kitchen tables. I'm working on sketching up some ideas for the y-shaped slabs with a nod to Nakashima's work.

The wood is being sent to the kiln and should be ready in about a month...I can't wait.

Nakashima

2008-10-24T13:57:00.005-04:00

I just came across George Nakashima's work for the first time the other day. Do you know how it feels to have an idea that you just can't find the right words to express? Then the next day you're walking along and a song comes on that says exactly what you want to say, but only a thousand times better than you could have ever said it. That's how I felt when I saw his furniture.

Simple, elegant, and honest. The raw beauty of the wood is magnified by the presentation, but at the same time functionality is dominant. Japanese joinery is an art in itself, and it's these techniques that make Nakashima's work so spectacular.

His work is a reminder of the beauty of simplicity and the natural world. It also acknowledges uniqueness and individuality.

I've ordered one of his books, The Soul of a Tree, and I'm looking forward to learning more about this great builder.

That Wood is Rotten!

2008-09-18T08:28:00.005-04:00

I recently completed a table that featured spalted maple, a very unique and beautiful wood. Spalting is basically a process that certain woods undergo while they rot! Who would have thought that letting something decay could actually make it more beautiful?

Insects and fungi are the two main mechanisms of decay in wood, with fungal decay causing the most deterioration. These parasitic fungi feed off carbohydrates and leave behind waste products that can stain and colour the wood. A certain kind of "white rot" is responsible for the spalted maple you see above, leaving behind black pigments as waste. The lines indicate zones of decay where the wood has been attacked by the rot.

If left in the right conditions for the right amount of time you can get some incredible results, but if left too long the wood will completely decay and turn to dust. To stop the rot is actually fairly easy, you just need to dry the wood below 20% moisture content and since most finished lumber is dried to 8-10% you don't need to worry about the rot once it has been properly dried.

So think about using some rotten wood next time, the results can be stunning!

Innovation (ie doing something NEW)

2008-09-07T21:37:00.000-04:00

It's probably a cliche to say, but it seems that innovation isn't that easy afterall.

A chair is a fairly simple object. It's not a space shuttle, it's not a quantum computer, it's not a carbon nano-tube; it's just a chair. It's been rebuilt, modified, extended, reworked, cut, carved, bent, and molded...and after all of that it's still just a chair.

Stephen Hogbin is an artist/woodworker with incredible skill and, more importantly, an incredible ability to innovate. In the 70's he decided that he wanted to try turning really big pieces of wood (like 76" in diameter big) because he believed that taking slices of these massive turnings would reveal cross sections of tremendous beauty. At the time there was no way to turn a 7' piece of wood on a lathe, but with his father in law's help Hogbin pieced together a variable speed lathe to realize his vision using the differential and rear axle from a truck.

Hogbin's work is valuable because it's both beautiful and inspirational. It may seem simple, but what Hogbin did in creating his truck axle lathe is what innovation requires: a vision and the tools required to realize that vision. If the tools don't exist you just have to go out there and create them yourself...

Here's a link to his website where you check out some of his work:

http://www.makersgallery.com/hogbin/

I know it's just a chair, but to me it's more than that. To me it's an example of what it takes to create something that is truly NEW...and you know what, to me innovation is a beautiful thing.