The American Peasant Substack
Black & White Furniture Finishes
Chris has experimented with several techniques, including dyes and bleaches and other chemicals to make wood black and white. This entry is basically where he's ended up.
(Free for everyone)
The Frustrating Bias Against Strut-leg Chairs
Stretcher-less stick chairs – what we call "strut-leg" chairs – have survived just fine for centuries. Some of Chris's favorite Welsh chairs lack stretchers, including the first stick chair he built in 2003. Yet, few people want to make them.
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2 Questions for You
The most important lesson Chris has learned from lawyers deals with clients and customers. And that is: How do you start a relationship right, then keep it on track?
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Earlywood: I Love Difficult Teachers
This is a tricky topic to discuss. Good teaching can resemble abuse – at least from the outside. But Chris doesn't think that good teachers ever actually abuse their students. Instead, he's found that his best teachers were both scrupulously fair and uncompromising.
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The Anarchist's Compass No. 2
If you demand a discount…
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The Anarchist's Apprentice Substack
Wax-On, Wax-Off
It's been almost exactly one year since Chris plucked Kale from a bakery to mold them into a chair minion (Kale's words). Now, close to the anniversary of the first talk we ever had together in the bench room, Kale is in Wales: the Motherland.
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Never Sponsored Substack
Saddling Tools for Beginning Chairmakers
With tools for saddling a chair seat, the problems are that (1) there are so many different kinds, and (2) some of them are hard to come by. Beginning chairmakers get especially frustrated by this – and with good reason.
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