yoav_liberman

New York's premier furniture fair 2013 - part 1

2013-05-20T01:29:00Z

I just came back from my first visit to ICFF New York. The International Contemporary Furniture Fair is one of the most important events of the furniture world. It attracts makers, designers, collectors, decorators and architects, as well as the general public. The participants are an eclectic group of mainly furniture and lighting proprietors. Some are recent graduates woodworking programs who decided to bring their work to New York and to get exposure. Others are already well-established and attended in order to showcase their most recent collections.

What interested me the most were the designer-makers based in the North America who make original work in small to medium quantities. I met with many of them and took some pictures which I would like to share with you. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that so many of them are based in New York state and the greatest concentration seem to reside and work in Brooklyn. While some makers use traditional production techniques, others utilize the most cutting edge computer manufacturing approaches to allow them to compete with mass manufacturers and companies that produces furniture in parts of the world where production cost are much lower than here.

The ICFF will be open this week for the general public. If you happen to visit NYC this week I really recommend visiting the show's floor. Looking at the furniture and talking to makers will surely inspire you in your own voyage to create original woodworking.

OLGA guanabara is a Brooklyn based maker of steel and reclaimed wood furniture. They use rebars, steel tubing, redwoods and other industrial looking materials to form a kind of industrial-rastik looking furniture.

Wishbonewoodworking is another Brooklyn based firm that manufactures very elegant furniture that includes hidden details which can be discovered after you become acquainted with the piece for some time. Their elegant walnut chair is enriched by brass structural details that connect the back leg to the seat.

A few designers presented furniture that combine concrete and wood. Concrete and wood are married into the process of creating our homes, but to see furniture that couple the man-made stone and nature made wood is avant garde. Nico Yeketai of Sag Harbor, NY is one of the few artists who does this material match-making very well. Here are some of his pieces, including scale models that he built for clients as a proof of concept before making the pieces.

My new cutting board design

2013-05-12T19:09:00Z

A year ago I blogged about the cutting board workshop I gave on a Manhattan rooftop. The thing is that I also like to make and sell cutting boards. I love the simplicity and the presence of a thick and solid wooden board. They are so handy on the kitchen counter when food is chopped, or loaded with cheese and bread in the middle of a coffee table. Or, as a massive table trivet to carry a hot cast-iron pot to the center of a candle light dinner. I enjoy coming up with different designs for cutting boards and I think that a good board needs to be as nice to look at as it is to use. My newest design includes a wide hole and two channels that intersect it. A rope can nest in these channels to allow the board to stay flat. The rope is a nice detail that allow you to hang it on the wall for decoration or when you need to let it dry after washing.

To make the boards I began by milling the wood and crosscutting the individual boards to length. I continued to drill holes close to the crosscut egde. Then, I set up the router table and the bit and cut the channels. Following this comes the laborious and boring sanding chore, branding the boards with my hot stamp, and wet sanding them with organic flaxseed oil.

I am exited that Pod, a boutique housewares store in Brookline Massachusetts now carries my boards. Pod owner Julie has an exquisite taste in all aspects of design and what makes her store special is that they carry other goods made by American crafts persons.

Here are some picture of the making of the boards, and of the completed pieces.

These are the boards I made for Pod.....

And these are the Natural-edge boards I make when I find exiting scraps to work with.

Planing teak wood is no cake walk

2013-05-05T11:57:00Z

At my day job as wood-shop manager at Robert Lighton Furniture in New York, I often need to fine-tune furniture parts before I pass them over to our skilled sander, then on to the finishers. We design our furniture in the United States, but have them hand-made from reclaimed wood in India, mainly from old buildings posts and beams. In most cases the furniture arrives to our Brooklyn shop and requires only minor adjustments and fittings such as hardware, shelving, and leather-tops on both desks and cases of drawers. Sometimes whole components have to be reconstructed due to damage during shipment or because of a client's specific requests that can not be addressed by the Indian craftspersons. This week I worked on an tall teak armoire. I anticipated that it would be an easy job: adjusting the drawers, installing the lock and the escachuin, and adjusting the doors and the hinges. What I did not expect was a surprising discovery: planing teak can wreak havoc on your plane's blade and sole. I have been working with teak for a few years now and over time I noticed that it shortens the normal life span of the keen edge on my tools. In my view, teak resembles and feels like the tropical equivalent of our walnut in terms of its look and density. But unlike walnut, teak has a negative effect on our edge tools. Over the years I have learned to expect shorter intervals between honing, and I read that this is because teak is embedded with small particles of silica.

O.k. fast forward to Wednesday of this week. I finished installing the lock, adjusting the drawers and the door hinges. The only thing left for me to do was to trim the door stiles which were too proud and did not allow the doors from closing properly. I pulled out my Lie-Nielsen low angle block plane and started planing the teak's end grain. At first it all went well but then I started feeling that the plane and the surface it left behind was not doing that well. I saw lines on the end grain and I thought that perhaps I ran into a small metal particle too small to see, but big enough to nick my blade. So I lifted and turned the plane over and I could not believe my eyes. The plane's sole was scarred with cris-cross scratches, as if I was planing No 80 grit sand paper. After giving the teak end-grain a close look I saw the cause of all this. Small white particles of minerals (or the like) poke-a-dotted the surface. These were undoubtedly the guilty party in all of this. Are these "gems" the infamous silica particles I have read about? Or, perhaps I discovered a new species of wood contaminant un-known to the world of woodworking science?

I really don't know the answer, but I do know that I had to spend a lot of time sharpening and honing my plane's blade after this incident and I also know that from now on from now on I will look at teak in a totally different way than before. Those white minerals are like the icebergs that sank the Titanic. We should take their threat very seriously.

Here is the Armoire I worked on:

And here are picture of the minerals and the scratches they caused:

Jason's fold-out table

2013-04-28T20:09:00Z

Jason was one of my students in the cardboard furniture class that I teach at 3rdWard NY. For his project he found an old World War II design of a fold-out table. He then tweaked and modified it (including building several prototypes) until he was satisfied with the end result. Jason printed out his drawing, glued it onto a 1/4” cardboard sheet, and continued by cutting and folding the facets. As you can see the table is very sturdy. It can fold up or down quickly and reliably, and will surely serve Jason and his family for years to come.

The most "Woody" commercial you've ever seen

2013-04-20T16:40:00Z

I have said it before in this blog, actually just a few weeks ago: Japanese have an affinity to perfect everything and take it to a new level. Even a simple commercial for a mobile phone is made in a meticulous way (no I do not get royalties for it). So why should you watch this amazing commercial you may ask? Well because it will nourish your woodworker soul. Once you finish with the commercial you will surely want to see the second clip as it gives you an insider look to how they made it.

Why we should teach our children Woodworking in school

2013-04-03T13:27:00Z

Doug Stowe is one of the greatest proponents of Woodworking education in America. In this short video he lays out a compelling case for children to learn woodworking in schools: Woodworking is a gateway to understanding material properties, engineering, and the environment. Via woodworking kids are exposed to design, drawings, the importance of tools in our lives, and why planning ahead is so important. Lastly, woodworking activity strengthens the mind-hand connection, and contributes to the buildup of confidence in the mind of a young child.

The secrets of Japanese wooden toothpicks

2013-03-31T00:54:00Z

While visiting New York's Greenwich Village neighborhood this afternoon, I entered a Japanese American pop-up store that sells amazing chocolates and other sweets. The owner offered me an incredible dark chocolate truffle to sample. As expected from a representative of a nation that has perfected food serving ceremonies, the truffle was fished out of the container with the most cleverly designed toothpick that he then handed over to me to taste. The chocolate was undeniably delicious, but what really grabbed my attention was the toothpick. I'm sure this surprised the store's owner. Rather than doting on the chocolate as most customers do, I doted on the toothpick. Of particular interest were the grooves on the toothpick (the toothpick is only 2-1/2" long) that I had never seen before. The owner informed me that they are Japanese made and that they are designed to break away and provide a base for resting the toothpick when it is not in use.

I bring up this story as an example to underscore the possibility of even the most mundane of objects holding clever design secrets to be discovered. Design, aesthetic, and engineering have to work in concert to produce a good outcome, an ideal that Japanese craftsmen are notorious for.

After returning home I googled Japanese toothpick and discovered that an entire book was written on the history of the toothpick. The author of 'The Toothpick: Technology and Culture' is Prof Henry Petroski. He was interviewed on NPR a few years ago, and mentioned the developments in wood technology vis-a-vis the toothpick. I believe that you will enjoy listening to his 6 minute interview.

Prof Petroski's interview: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15681628

And if you would like to visit the divine chocolate store in NYC, here is their website: www.royceconfectusa.com

Visiting an Israeli Luthier

2013-03-16T16:34:00Z

While visiting Israel during the holidays, I paid a visit to the shop of Yaron Naor. Yaron is one of a few craftspeople who has mastered the art of Oud, Lute, and mandoline making. Building a string instrument is perhaps the most challenging feat in woodworking. While there are many aspects of general woodworking that overlap with instrument making, there are a few additional elements that distinguish a luthier's work from the work of a cabinetmaker.

Photo by: Harry Suraski

Photo by: Yoav Chen

While both cabinetmakers and luthiers must have sharp tools, a luthier has no room for error. He or she must constantly work with very precise, even "rocket science-like" measurements, and systems of very demanding tolerances often within the 1/1000 of an inch.This is necessary to ensure that the thickness of the parts he makes are within specs. Most high end instruments have very thin walls and these walls vary in thickness along their length and width.

Here is a picture of a thickness gauge that Yaron built to help him check the proper thickness of parts. He bought the gauge and built the frame from scratch.

The most painstaking part of the process of building instruments of the Lute family is constructing the hull. For this one needs to make thin strips of wood that are steam-banded and glued edge-to-edge on a form similar to the keel of a boat.

Building the instrument requires absolute precision. More than this, a luthier's work often demands vast knowledge in geometry, acoustics, and of course the "alchemy" of obscure finishing techniques. Still, Yaron manages to do even more than this. He invents, develops, and pushes the luthier envelope even further. For example, he recently developed a new way to structurally support the soundboard of his instruments with a leaf-like rib arrangement that add strength and stability.

Yaron is an avid documentarian of his work and has created many impressive albums that show how he builds his instruments. I highly recommend visiting his Picasa to learn about the laborious process that leads to the creation of a wonderful instrument that produces the most beautiful and inspiring sounds.

Here are links to a few of his albums:

Building a 5C Medieval Lute by Yaron Naor

Building a Turkish Oud by Yaron Naor

Yaron's album list at Picasa:

A new season of Roy Underhill's "The Woodright's Shop" to be watched for free

2013-03-02T16:47:00Z

Every time a new season of Roy Underhill's TV show is released I say "הללויה" (Hallelujah). Roy's show is like a festival for us woodworking lovers. In it he shows how to make woodworking using hand tools and man-powered machines. He invites makers and artists to show how to build furniture, musical instruments, and even tools. Roy also demonstrates how centuries-old woodcarving and woodturning was done. He displays all kinds of old woodworking contraptions, hardware, and extinct fabrication techniques.

Roy is a great educator and a funny presenter. He single-handedly manages to compress into less than 30 minutes an overwhelming amount of mesmerizing content. Thanks to North Carolina's PBS network, we can now watch his show for free.

Do yourself a big favor and clear some time this weekend to watch his show. I promise you that you will get "Clamped" to your seat and would not want to stop watching the show until you finish all past and present episodes that are available on the web (2006 - 2013).

Here is a link to Roy Underhill's latest TV show season:

http://www.pbs.org/woodwrightsshop/video/3200/index.html

A woodworker character is born on TV's Portlandia

2013-02-19T23:05:00Z

Everyone knows Portlandia as the quintessential showcase of Hipster culture. Part of becoming a hipster involves striving toward some sort of self reliance or at least dexterity of something: pickle making, cigar rolling, knitting, and taxidermy, just to name a few. The new episode of Portlandia reveals woodworkers to be at the top of the food chain amongst hipsters.

Watch this hilarious clip and you will get what I mean..

(Please visit the site to view this media)

Gun control and the trajectory of a furniture project: Artillery table en route to Baltimore

2013-02-15T14:27:00Z

My friend Jake Wright is a very talented maker-designer. He creates graphic and web design, exquisite furniture, and is a skilled woodworker welder. Jake is perhaps best known for incorporating military relics such as empty cluster bombs and artillery shells in the beautiful furniture and lighting fixtures that he devises. His achievements in that field are remarkable and his pieces have appeared on leading design websites and have been featured in cutting-edge maker fairs. Jake has many anecdotes to tell about unfortunate misunderstandings regarding his pieces. Because they are made from old army surplus, people (sometimes government authorities) make Jake's business life quite complicated. He once told me about the ordeal of sending one of his pieces to Germany and how his cast iron empty bomb lamp had to be sent back by German customs because it was rigidly categorized as a "weapon". Last week he told me yet another story about how he decided to hand-deliver a table he built to client in Baltimore, thinking that this would be better and safer for him – and the piece – only to discover that carrying furniture on Amtrak is much more complicated than one would expect. Read this funny story on Jake's blog and take a look at his great creations on his website: http://www.stockpiledesigns.com/

Below are pictures of Jake's table in the making: what a blast!

Turned wood teapot to be included in an upcoming show at the Fuller Craft Museum – Part 3

2013-02-08T10:54:00Z

In my last post I mentioned how I completed the piece and brought it to the gallery.

The gallery owner looked at the teapot and seemed surprised, explaining that she expected a bigger lid than the one I produced. She encouraged me to try and see if I could change it or increase its size. Quite honestly, my first urge was to fiercely defend my artistic vision. But, I gave it some thought and decided to swallow my pride and make an effort to empathize with her reaction. Coincidentally, on my way home I noticed a “Free Stuff” box on the side of the street. The box contained old photography equipment and other chatychkes. The item that caught my eyes was an old camera flash, the kind that opens up into a dome-shape.

When I saw this a light-bulb immediately flashed in my head and I knew this fan would become the new lid for the teapot. I turned a walnut finial that acted as a hub and hanging knob for the re-formed lid. The knob facilitates the opening and closing of the fan. The lid can be taken in and out of the arm-cage.

When I revealed the new and improved teapot to the gallery owner she glowed. We were both enthusiastic about the alteration. The rest is history.

Once the teapot show ended in Cambridge it reopened in SOFA Chicago. When that show closed I sent the teapot to Del Mano gallery in LA. There it was spotted by Gloria and Sonny Kamm, the renowned teapot collectors who added it to their collection.

Turned wood teapot, to be included in an upcoming show at the Fuller Craft Museum – Part 2

2013-02-06T13:19:00Z

My last entry focused on the fortuitous way I found the raw material and tracked the design process. This time I will show how I created the teapot.

First, I glued together the remains of the shattered wood bowl with black epoxy. I followed a similar technique that archeologists utilize to reassemble historic ceramic objects.

Second, I made the teapot arm-base from laminated walnut. I asked my friend and frequent collaborator, metal-artist Leslie Hartwell, to create the copper & brass arm girder.

After all the pieces were assembled I hung the sugar lid by the arm and took a picture of the piece.

I put the teapot in a box and took it to the gallery. What followed was a unique chain of events that I could have not anticipated.

Read about what happened next in my third and final blog entry about the flash teapot to be posted in the next few days.

Turned wood teapot, to be included in an upcoming show at the Fuller Craft Museum – Part 1

2013-01-31T20:34:00Z

Some of you might be wondering if a real teapot be made of wood. The truthful answer is, unfortunately, no. Wood is obviously not the best container for hot water. Therefore, the piece that I will describe to you here is solely a decorative art piece rather than a functional tea pot.

It all began on an early spring morning back in 2002. I was approaching the Harvard Museum of Natural History for a quick visit when I noticed a group of pruned branches lying on the ground near an old Maple tree. Upon first glance, I was inspired to make something out of them. I grew quite excited by the interplay between their color, grain, and unique patterns of decay which, through my artist’s eyes, signaled a great deal for aesthetic potential. I knew immediately that I would like to turn them into something special.

I used the branches to create more than one piece. I turned one into a bowl called "State of the Union" that appeared in 500 Wood Bowls (Lark, 2004).

Another branch was turned into a smaller bowl that was, unfortunately, broken to many pieces before I completed it. The remains of this bowl collected dust on a shelf in my studio for two years before I received (and accepted) an invitation to build a teapot for The Teapot Redefined show at Mobilia gallery in Cambridge. When I began to brainstorm ideas for the teapot, I recalled the broken bowl. After sketching a few options I realized it would be perfect to use as the foundation for the new piece.

Another piece in the teapot puzzle I had to consider was the lid. In the spirit of using reclaimed materials, I recalled that I once found a lid made of silver, possibly from a sugar container. I thought that this lid might complement the design and couture of the pot. So, after a few more sketches a scale drawing emerged, charting my course of action.

Stay tuned to my next blog entry where I will continue to explain how I made this piece.

Thoughts about Krenov-style wooden planes

2013-01-26T23:09:00Z

I spent the last two weeks of 2012 in Israel interviewing woodworkers, touring shops, and visiting places of interest to us furniture makers that I never even knew existed. I am very excited to share all of it, but it will take several entries to do so.

In my first blog entry about this trip I will talk about my visit to Etz Ladaat woodworking school and my reflections on using a well-tuned Krenov-style plane that is made onsite at the school in the Sea of Galilee region. Nathan and Oren (Oren is "Pine", in Hebrew) founded this most wonderful school and teach classes in a variety woodworking subjects. Their beginners class students are given a few simple, yet important projects. One of these projects is making a stool. The stool is constructed primarily using dovetail joints, while a secondary element is a stabilizing rail that is secured using a wedged mortise and tenon joint. Through this project, students learn the basics of planing, joinery, and stable construction techniques. Have a look at a couple of elegant examples:

As the class progresses, the students embark on making their own Krenov-style plane. The plane is built from scratch at the school and the blades are imported from Ron Hock's, California. I have to say: what an amazing trans-continental collaboration!

Those of you who follow this blog will know that I am not a stranger to wooden planes. Over the years I have owned several and made good use of them, mainly in molding work. But, I have to say that I have never fallen in love with them. Tuning them just seems to be too mysterious and unpredictable. Their light weight can feel insubstantial. And, the fact that their body can alter its geometry as result of humidity changes, or loose its flatness simply because of natural sole erosion, makes me too anxious to use on a daily basis.

During my visit to the school I was given the opportunity to use a wooden plane made by one of the students. I assumed that if the student made it and the teachers approved it, I could hop on the horse and shave away. Alas, I was so wrong. The shavings that I produced where short and varied in width. In comparison, the shavings that Oren created were continuous and wide. I felt as if the plane was behaving like a horse, trained to work better with its owner than with a stranger. I tried all kind of tricks to improve my performance, changing the pressure on the plane body as I went, clamping down harder on the blade casing, but with no such luck.

At the end I managed to plane better, but not even close to that of Oren the "wiz". Still, I had a lot of fun trying.

So, in conclusion, wooden planes are still not for me. I prefer the predictability and maximized control I get from a good quality Bailey style. I like all the features associated with it and I think that this makes my planing life simpler. But, wow, were those wooden planes beautiful. And, how lucky the students of Etz Ladaat are to be able to create their own tool. If you're in Israel, this is THE place to study. There may be some "study abroad" opportunities in the future, and I'll keep everyone posted when they are formalized.

From right to left: Nathan, Oren, Yoav