Custom Furniture

THE ART AND CRAFT OF FURNITURE MAKING

Furniture making is a combination of knowledge, practiced skills, and personal abilities.  A quality item of furniture is a combination of selected woods, design, joinery, applied details, and surface finishing.  All of these elements must come together for any item of furniture or cabinetry to have long term life, functionality, and harmony.

MY AREAS OF INTEREST AS A FURNITURE MAKER

Furniture makers can make styles of furniture to suit the clients taste.  My interest is in American 18th century furniture.  Two distinctly different styles influence the items of furniture that I produce, Federal furniture and Shaker furniture.  Federal furniture from the 1790’s onward interests me for it’s embellishments of bell flowers, lines, berries, and veneering.  Shaker furniture is of interest to me for it’s simplicity of lines, internal strength, lack embellishments, and functionality linked to a specific purpose.

METHODS OF WORK AND MATERIALS

I use modern power tools to rough dimension the lumber from the mill. Hand planes, saws, chisels, draw knifes, and a host of other 18th and 19th century hand tools are used to make moldings, cut dovetails, join wood, flatten surfaces, and edge table tops. Your finished item of furniture will be made using hand tools of the style used in the 18th and 19th Century in your choice of natural hard woods.  Mahogany, tiger maple, hard maple, and cherry are typically used with tulip poplar as the secondary wood.  Ash, eastern pine, and walnut are also readily available as a primary wood choice.

FEDERAL FURNITURE  

Federal Furniture is influenced by regional interpretations as well as period in time. Mahogany was the primary wood used in Federal furniture from the coastal regions of America.  Walnut was a primary wood for Federal furniture from inland areas.  Cherry was a popular primary wood throughout the Colonies. Other primary woods can be identified to specific regions.

As cabinet making matured in America the use of veneers and inlay became popular. Beginning in the 1790’s veneers, banding, stringing, pictorial inlays, and other embellishments represent my primary areas of federal furniture interest. I enjoy making these inlay tables.  Demilune tables, Pembroke tables, dressing glasses, and pier tables are a special interest of mine.

SHAKER FURNITURE

Shaker Furniture is influenced by a sub-group of religious believers that flourished and grew until the 1860’s in America.  The Shakers were a religious cult that lived in communities of their own design, segregated from the outside world that surrounded them. The scale, proportion, and design of Shaker furniture had a direct link to its intended functional application.  Some of the Shaker furniture is uniquely asymmetrical because it was built to the needs of the individual communities or a specific application. Shaker craftsman were free to develop designs that resulted in new combinations of drawers, doors, work surfaces, and shelving that reflected their culture, a desire for simplicity, and devotion to their religious beliefs.

Shaker furniture can be quite unique as in their sewing tables, counters with drawers that graduate both vertically and horizontally, and cupboards over a case of drawers.  In many examples of Shaker furniture it is clear that form was strictly governed by function.

I can design and construct Shaker type furniture as well as produce Shaker reproduction furniture. Chest, cabinets, double drop leaf tables, desks, counters, sewing desks, tripod stands, blanket boxes, and wash stands are typical of the items I produce.

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