Archives

In December I built a large traditional tool chest for my shop at home, and I couldn’t stop staring at the end grain of the wide pine planks I’d selected for the walls of the chest. Though I work [...]

A classic form from the New Lebanon Shaker community is easy to build in a few hours. If you don’t like nails, then perhaps you should turn the page. This small wall cupboard from the New Lebanon [...]

Swiped from a French engraving, this easy tool rack works in your shop or even in your kitchen. It’s good to keep your tools protected (think: tool chest). But it’s also good to keep them handy [...]

Bench planes come in a wide range of lengths and widths. Do you need them all? Which ones are most useful? And if you only had to buy one....

Chris Schwarz shares a dovetailing method perfect for beginners. This method helps build good habits when sawing and helps you fix any mistakes.

Years ago when I was editor at Popular Woodworking, I was interviewed for a job at one of our competitors. During the interview, I experienced one of those fork-in-the-road moments where a single [...]

It’s the easiest question in the world: Who is your favorite woodworker? A fellow craftsman asked me this question earlier this month, and I still don’t have a good answer. I have one easy [...]

Even if you have a gold-plated fancy-pants laser-guided dovetail saw, you should also own the $15 Zona dovetail saw because it’s so dang cheap and so dang handy for small-scale work. I’ve written [...]

Handscrews don’t get enough credit in the shop. This ancient clamp is often neglected in favor of modern clamps. But the handscrew is often the simplest solution to a tricky workholding problem. [...]

It’s no secret that I love Benchcrafted products. I recommend their bench vises without any reservations and have them installed on almost all of our workbenches in our workshop. When [...]

When I emerged from my mother’s womb I had a small knife clipped to my baby fat at my waist. I immediately used the knife to cut the umbilical cord. Then I folded the knife (for safety) and [...]

Big fat granite surface plates are nice, but they are overkill for most woodworking shops. The granite surface plates are intended for machinists and other metalworkers who work to thousandths or [...]