the next 8

ok, next up .. 8 more ladderbacks, this time with leather seats and not corded like the last 12 ..

trevor chris and tyler are whipping these into shape while the previous 12 are in the 

finishing process.  the table that goes with them is coming along too .. 

below are a few more shots.  click the pictures to enlarge them ..

parts and pieces ... lots of them ..

three sets of metal legs in the shop at once!  doesn't happen like that often ...
2k per set before we start to drill tap and polish .. but nice when they are done!

                               is there such a thing as a cnc square chisel mortiser?  there should be ..

 ready for stretchers ...

 picking and choosing the boards for the top

glued up .. bottom side showing here

the chairs will be like this one when they are finished

another claro walnut live edge table

ok .. all done .. 1/21 ... having a little saturday photoshoot with trevor at jk adams, where we have been working on this 5' x 11' table .. they had this handy rolling stairway, like at the lumberyard, that

gave me a really nice elevated perspective on the table top, which is never easy to do in my own shop.

lots and lots of florescent lights, but we managed to warm things up with a couple of photo hot lights and

some cardboard blockers.  

a little photoshop cutting and stamping .. it kinda looks like it's floating a little, but you get the idea ..

i could do a little more work on this photo it if the spirit moves me .. 

the story is below ...

another new year, another claro walnut table ... i've lost count now, but
as you can see from this slide show, we have certainly made a bunch of them ..

this one will be about 11' long and 4' to 5' wide.  the client is undecided whether to

trim it more parallel or leave it with the flared live edge .. they have got some time to consider it

as it just arrived at jk adams on friday .. hooray for forklifts and big open workspaces!
click the photos to enlarge them ...

we made some 'visual aids' to help them decide .. two 1/10th scale models, one trimmed and 

one with the natural edge, with the pictures good hope hardwoods had of the slab on their website

the clients have decided to go with the full width, live edge version,
and trevor is working away on it, really away, as he is actually at our friend's
factory, JK Adams, down the road in downtown dorset.
he made some good progress today ...

from the website photos, we thought this would be the face, but,

as it turns out, there were two pieces of fence stuck in the slab which made

a dark stain deep in the wood .. also, on this side, the cracks are bigger as it is closer

to the center of the tree. 

the other side of the slab below, has some really spectacular

grain and color, and smaller and fewer cracks.

and no metal or metal stains on this side ...

so we're gonna go with this one, pending the client's approval

we cut the slab closer to its final length this morning and back at the shop made 

some sample blanks from the cut offs ... it is going to be a sweet one ... 

first coat of finish on this one ... more photos soon

moving along .. filled the cracks and routed for the base pieces and stiffeners today ..
update 1/19/17

working on the top last week

working on the bottom and the steel base pieces this week..

 and the shipping crates for its journey to the big island next week  ..

more as we move along ... 

12 chairs

so, we're making some chairs ... 20 of them to be exact, for two different clients.  

12 with the danish cord seats, and 8 like the ones with the leather seats below ...

first up are the corded seats ..

trevor cuts most of these parts, including the shaped rear legs and 

the mortises for the rails and horizontals on the cnc ... and he has a couple of
specialized jigs for cutting the tenons on the ends of both the
curved pieces and the straight rails.

ditto on the front legs and rails ...

and then you've got your 'most expensive nails in the world',

or at least, close to it ... there are about 170 some per chair .. they come from denmark and there are over 400 bucks worth in these twelve chairs.

in the past, our seat weaver, sandy sherman chair caning in brookline,

vermont has added the nails after we delivered the chairs to her for cording.

we always predrilled the holes for  her with the cnc, and this time i 

had the bright idea of adding the nails before the chairs were glued up ... 

duh ... much easier this way then nailing them into a finished chair ... 

sandy appreciates that for sure ...

so, here they are ready to be glued up ...

 

which happens in a number of stages.  front legs and rails ..

rear legs, rails, and slats ... and finally front leg assemblies to back legs ...

they'll look like the ones below when they are finished ..

good to go below .. waiting for finish ...

and next up .. below  are all the parts but the back legs, roughed out
for the next 8, which will have leather seats.

so, another staggering statistic ... photos on google +

i was getting ready to organize my 'photos from 2016' slide show, like i've done every year since 2009 and i checked my 'slideshows' section and logged in to my google + profile page where it shows all my photo collections 

a brief scroll through them showed that after 8 + years of blogging, i have over 10,000 images there for public viewing.   there used to be links to the blog posts that every picture is from, but somehow, google + changed picasa and now sometimes they show and sometimes they don't .. i would really like to figure out how to make them show every time ... any ideas folks?  leave a comment or send an email please.

 a very interesting (to me) visual diary of recent pieces and events ....

like 2,000,000 + page views is a lot of page views, 10,000 photos on the web is a lot of photos ...

a reproduction chest base

1/4/17 .. finished the chest base (finally) ... took a little longer than i hoped, but the client loved it.
we'll deliver it on  monday .. pleased with the way it looks .. an interesting and challenging project

my client has had this case, he informed me today, for 22 years .. it's a beauty.

nice cherry, nice color, nice proportions ... all we have to do is make a base

to match the photo below ...

 we're going to have to do what some folks would call some 'real woodworking'.

 make/carve four legs with trifid feet, makes some fancy aprons and add some moldings.
and then, simply just match the new base to the old case ...
the staining and finishing will likely be one of the tougher parts of the porcess.

studying up a bit with my israel sack 'good,better,best' book
and in norman vandals book on queen anne furniture
plus there is some good stuff on the internet ..

we are going to try to end up with something like this one
and the one in the photo above

these images are stills from a helpful brief video from mary may's carving school

i'm going to carve at least one sample leg in basswood before i head into the cherry .
should be fun ..
.. ------------------------------------------------------ ..
okay .. we're on it now ..
most  furniture makers would agree with me that there is nothing easier
than copying a piece of furniture from a photograph .... ha ha ha ha ..
it can be done, but it ain't easy in my humble opinion ..

first shot at it .. click the photos to enlarge them ..

head on

proposed adjustments

comparison ... more photos as we progress