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When I took my first woodworking class in 1993 I was gung-ho to learn two things: through-tenons and through-dovetails. At the time I was intoxicated by Arts & Crafts furniture...

In this business, there are a few things you don’t share: Finishing secrets, wood sources and saliva. This post breaks one of those three cardinal rules – revealing excellent wood...

While Horton Brasses has agreed to produce some custom pieces of campaign hardware for the chest/secretary I’m building for Popular Woodworking Magazine, that doesn’t squelch my desire to see what...

After posting this story about the campaign-style fork and knife, I got an e-mail from woodworking researcher extraordinaire Jeff Burks. Burks, a trade carpenter, is a voracious collector of books,...

When I hang out with other woodworkers, the conversation almost always turns to what we are building now and what we are building next. Recently I said something I didn’t...

In 19th-century English workshops you could be sacked (fired) for wearing eyeglasses. There are even accounts of how a shop might have a certain phrase that was spoken when the...

Campaign chests had to take a beating. They traveled all over the British Empire during the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries. And yet they bore their burden without complaint...

I’ve made the following statement at least a dozen times in strategy meetings, classrooms and beer halls: Someone should review furniture hardware. After all, if the hardware stinks, I think...

A knock at the door at 8:01 a.m. today marked the beginning of my campaign chest project. Sure, I’ve been sketching, studying and digging up details on campaign chests for...

This week I’m cutting a bunch of half-blind dovetails in oak – oak on the pin board and oak on the tail board. This is somewhat trickier than dovetailing softer...

When I built a Moxon double-screw vise last year for sawing and other chores, I tried to keep it as simple and close to the 17th-century original as I could....

The shows from the latest season of Roy Underhill’s “The Woodwright’s Shop” can now be viewed online for free through this link. What, you are still here and reading my...