17th-century style New england carving:
Dedham panels
The first in a series on carving patterns I learned from studying 17th-century New England furniture. These 5 designs stem from a large group of chests and boxes from the towns of Dedham and Medfield, Massachusetts made between about 1650 and 1700.
Broken into 3 videos, just under 3 hours in total length, you’ll see a little bit about the originals these carvings are based on, as well as how I layout the patterns and cut them.
MAKING A JENNIE ALEXANDER CHAIR
WITH PETER FOLLANSBEE
Shortly after Lost Art Press published the 3rd edition of Jennie Alexander’s Make a Chair from a Tree I made a vimeo-on-demand series of how I (then) made the chair. I began teaching it at Pete Galbert’s shop around the same time - and the video series includes a change or two we made to the process.
It’s just over 9 hours of videos - broken into chapters/sections. The price is $75. It’s available at https://vimeo.com/ondemand/jachairpf
Joiner’s W0rk: Make a Carved Joined Chest
with Peter Follansbee
One of my favorite projects is a joined, carved chest. I’ve made over 50 of them altogether. A couple of years ago I set out to shoot a video of the process in detail. The project is a copy of a 1660s-80s chest with a drawer made in Braintree, Massachusetts. I restored a fragment of one twenty years ago and studied about 12 related examples when researching an article I wrote about them. All made with hand tools from riven oak with sawn pine boards as the secondary wood.
The videos amount to over 20 hours and are available as the full set for $75 or as individual “chapters/episodes” at $15 each. The link is
https://vimeo.com/ondemand/follansbeejoinedchest
a short trailer below:
Making a Brettstuhl by Peter Follansbee
My most recent (2024) video series is about making a German/Austrian/Swiss, etc style “brettstuhl” or “board-chair.” I learned about these vernacular chairs from work done by two friends/teachers of mine - Drew Langsner and Daniel O’Hagan.
Made from a mixture of sawn and riven stock, these chairs feature mortise and tenon joinery, carving and shaping and more. They are a great combination of simple and complex - which makes them a fun and challenging project.
The video series is over 3 hours long (with one more episode to come, on carving) and costs $50.
The link is https://vimeo.com/ondemand/follansbeebrettstuhl
A long (11-minute) trailer is here:
