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Here is one of my favorite finishes for any wood that is ring-porous or diffuse-porous. I call it “dirty mahogany” or “creepy janitor.” First a warning: I think this finish looks like crap on [...]

Whether you know it or not, you’ve probably seen a Roorkhee chair (or its children) at some point in your life. The Roorkhee chair was supposedly invented at the end of the 19th century for the [...]

With this class in building Roorkhee chairs, I bit off way less than I could chew. After the second day, we just have to finish up a couple details on the leather and metal work before we start [...]

Most classes I teach end up being a “dovetail death march” (in a good way). There is a lot of traditional joinery, late nights, sore feet and little hope of finishing the project in five days. [...]

I leave for Germany in a couple weeks to teach classes on making Roorkhee chairs (piece of pie!) and bowsaws. Yup. Making bowsaws. You’ve probably seen my international treatise on bowsaws: [...]

At one of the woodworking schools where I teach there is a quote hanging on the wall that has always bugged me a bit. I’ll paraphrase it: In 100 years, people will only care WHAT you did, not HOW [...]

When I teach a woodworking class, I give my students free reign with my tools. It’s a great way for them to get a feel for tools that are sharp and in order. It’s also a great way to get …

I make it a point to avoid blogging about sharpening. It is the simplest thing to do that is made confusing by too much talk and too many commercial products. I honestly do not care how you [...]

When I first mentioned the topic of my latest DVD, my e-mail inbox filled up with messages such as: “This project is beneath you. Beneath all of us. You traitor.” And that’s the G-rated version. [...]

Woodworkers are shy people – especially at the beginning of their journey. They make parts or assemblies oversized and then plane, sand or rasp them to fit. On one hand, this makes sense. It’s [...]

In some high technology circles there is an expression they use when engineers move too quickly to launch a project. They have “go fever” and are willing to overlook horrible mistakes in order to [...]

While I like and appreciate strict reproductions, I’ve always preferred to design my own stuff. How do I design a piece? In the only way I know how. It’s not easy. There are no formulas or rules [...]