A completed piece of furniture provides a feeling of satisfaction and accomplishment that people who don’t make furniture miss out on. I suppose it’s like most things in life that take dedicated effort and practice; those who have been there … Continue reading →
I’ve written before about Dean Mattson and his work as a shop teacher at North Salem High School in Salem, Oregon. Shortly after meeting him online, I published “The Future of Woodshop, Win, Win, Win.” That inspired me to travel … Continue reading →
Last week I was honored to be a guest at a chair building class at the Chidwick School of Fine Woodworking in Stevensville, Montana. Most classes at Chidwick’s are comprised of guys in their fifties whose lives are pretty well … Continue reading →
Please Note: The paperback edition of this book has been replaced with a hardcover. CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS OF THE NEW HARDCOVER EDITION OF THE “Great Book of Shop Drawings for Craftsman Furniture”. Revised Edition of the “Great Book of … Continue reading →
This is the season for high school graduation, and after the parties are over it’s time to adjust to the real world. Kids fresh out of school don’t have a lot of good choices. It’s either off to college, the … Continue reading →
My latest video is now available. This is one of my favorite sitting/learning/teaching projects and it was featured on the cover of the final issue of the now defunct “Woodworking” magazine. It’s a strong, sturdy and useful stool, and the … Continue reading →
Shop Drawings and Professional Methods for Designing and Constructing Every Kind of Kitchen and Built-in Cabinet This new technical handbook shows woodworkers exactly how to approach the complex job of designing and making built-in cabinets for kitchens, family rooms, and … Continue reading →
With the release of SketchUp 2014 come a couple of options for drawing arcs. In the past arcs were drawn by selecting a start point, an end point and then specifying a “bulge” distance. That’s a useful way to draw … Continue reading →
One of the ways SketchUp resembles woodworking is that it’s easy to get caught up in messing around with the tools and never get any real work done. In my classes this year I only hinted at the ability to … Continue reading →
The good folks at SketchUp recently released an updated version of my favorite 3D modeling program. As with previous versions of SketchUp there are two versions, the free for personal use “SketchUp Make” and the more advanced version “SketchUp Pro”. … Continue reading →
When the “Great Book of Shop Drawings for Craftsman Furniture” was published, I hoped to include all of the material from the three books that were originally published individually, “Shop Drawings for Craftsman Furniture”, “More Shop Drawings for Craftsman Furniture” … Continue reading →
SketchUp is a great tool to quickly draw parts for furniture and cabinet projects. Even better is the fact that if you know how to organize all the bits and pieces of the model you hardly need to draw at … Continue reading →
New SketchUp Book, “Building Blocks of SketchUp” Now Available for Download “Building Blocks of SketchUp” is the best way to learn the basics of 3D Modeling with SketchUp. With 260 pages of illustrated text, with 50 embedded video lessons this … Continue reading →
I think of a SketchUp model as a resource for building the real thing. Making the model is like a dress rehearsal, you go through all the steps of the process, and you can solve problems with the Undo command, … Continue reading →
When you write and publish a book independently, you don’t need to worry about the bean counters or the salesmen. You can do what you want. In “Building Blocks of SketchUp” I tried to write the book I would have … Continue reading →
With the release of SketchUp 2013, many of the tool icon images changed. What hasn’t changed is that for efficient work in SketchUp, you should be using keyboard shortcuts instead of clicking on the icons in the toolbars, at least … Continue reading →
One of the most important lessons I have learned in teaching people how to make 3D models in SketchUp is that different people learn in different ways. It’s a huge mistake for anyone involved in teaching or writing about how … Continue reading →
One of the things I don’t like about magazine articles is the lack of photos of the finished project. There simply isn’t room for more than one “beauty shot” within the six or eight allotted pages. I’ve had the cover … Continue reading →
“Classic Arts & Crafts Furniture: 14 Timeless Designs” is a collection of project articles from Popular Woodworking Magazine, built by Robert W. Lang between 2004 and 2013. The entire book is a fresh design, and the many of the original … Continue reading →
Picking a favorite project is like deciding which of your children you love the most. Picking my favorite kid would be easy, I only have the one. Among all the things I’ve made from wood, the Byrdcliffe Linen Press is … Continue reading →
DVD — Build an Arts & Crafts Mantle Clock is now available. Click Here for More Information and to Order Click Here for Photos of the Finished Clock The project I recently completed, a reproduction of a C.F.A. Voysey mantel … Continue reading →
When I was a self employed furniture maker and cabinetmaker I didn’t have much choice about what I would build, it was mostly a matter of what a client wanted and was willing to pay for. For the last 9 … Continue reading →
A couple of weeks ago, I was the special guest in the WoodCentral chatroom, taking questions on Arts & Crafts furniture and trying to keep up. A transcript of the March 11, 2013 chat is now available online at WoodCentral. … Continue reading →
One of the things I like most about building reproductions is that it takes me out of familiar territory and puts me in a place where the easy way out isn’t an option. If left to my own devices, I … Continue reading →
PLEASE NOTE: A NEW, REVISED EDITION OF “WOODWORKER’S GUIDE TO SKETCHUP” IS NOW AVAILABLE. CLICK HERE FOR INFORMATION ABOUT THE “NEW WOODWORKER’S GUIDE TO SKETCHUP” SketchUp Book Now Available As a Download Woodworker’s Guide to SketchUp is a unique … Continue reading →
The video content of “Woodworker’s Guide to SketchUp” is embedded within the text. It’s a cool feature that greatly enhances the learning experience. You read in detail about a technique, then you can watch a short video that shows you … Continue reading →
Last fall we spent four days teaching SketchUp to a group of woodworkers from the Gwinnet Woodworkers Association in Atlanta, Georgia. The group was enthusiastic enough to establish a SketchUp special interest group within the club. They meet regularly, and … Continue reading →
Woodworker’s Guide to SketchUp is approaching its third birthday. It’s a unique work; it really isn’t a book although there are almost 200 pages to it. It comes on a disc in PDF format and what makes it different is … Continue reading →
I’ve written a lot about my new book the “Great Book of Shop Drawings for Craftsman Furniture”, and I’m admittedly biased. I wrote the original book in this series because I thought that the furniture of the American Arts & … Continue reading →
A Free Excerpt from the “Great Book of Shop Drawings for Craftsman Furniture” Step One: Cut all the pieces to the sizes listed in the cut list. Please don’t do that. Not if you’re building from the large format plans … Continue reading →
By request, here is the Table of Contents for the compilation book “Great Book of Shop Drawings for Craftsman Furniture.” Most of the larger pieces are available as large format plans, and you can see images of those pieces at … Continue reading →
Quartersawn white oak isn’t the easiest wood to work, but with experience and an understanding of its character, it is steady and predictable. In gaining that experience, you’ll better understand your own character. The work becomes a partnership between man … Continue reading →
One of my favorite features of SketchUp Pro is the solid tools. I do a lot of detailed models of furniture, and these tools make my life a lot easier and my work go much faster. I can take a … Continue reading →
When I teach SketchUp classes, I try to spend at least half my time looking over the shoulders of students, answering questions and coaching them past the hard parts. The answer to almost every question (and the solution to the … Continue reading →
Gustav Stickley, while an innovator in design, did not work single-handedly, and his work does show influences from designs that were seen in England prior to the introduction of his Craftsman furniture. Although Stickley’s daughter Barbara, maintained that Harvey Ellis … Continue reading →
The Gustav Stickley No. 332 Morris chair is an iconic example of Arts & Crafts period furniture. It isn’t as flashy as the bow arm or bent arm chairs, but it’s a challenging project. In my never-ending hunt for details … Continue reading →
Furniture from the American Arts & Crafts period is extremely popular, but it is also misunderstood. We’re not even sure what to call it. Is the correct name Mission or Craftsman or something else? Much of the confusion comes from … Continue reading →
Sometimes our brains get wrapped around a problem, and we think we know what we need to solve it. A typical situation is a subtle angle, and a typical response is a desire to define it numerically: Purchased the two … Continue reading →
Don’t Draw if You Can Copy & Copy is Part of the Move Command It’s easy to miss the obvious when you’re learning something new, and that was my experience when learning SketchUp. Once again, my AutoCAD experience was more … Continue reading →
Components Are Crucial My abilities in SketchUp took a great leap forward when I gave up on drawing and began modelling, and I was able to take that step when I got a grip on using components rather than dealing … Continue reading →
