Joined stool & carved panel for sale

joined stool, red oak, Nov 2024

[details below - if you would like to purchase either of these items, send me an email at PeterFollansbee7@gmail.com and we can sort out details. Check or paypal (paypal price will be a bit higher for their fee…]

I got the joined stool photographed today. Warts and all as they say. In this case, simple stuff typical of this sort of work - the riven surface on the inside of that stile (leg) facing us on the right/rear. I always am glad to see that in period work because it tells me so much - not just about the process - proof that the stock was riven, not sawn - but also about tolerances. Many woodworkers would reject a piece like that. I learned that in many cases, you can go ahead and use it and it’ll work out just fine. 

In other places the oak is discolored from weathering outdoors prior to being worked in the shop. Usually these weathered patches disappear in planing (or turning, carving, etc) - but in rare cases the stock is close to finished size and the discoloration remains. It’s mostly jarring to us when the object is brand-new - like these photos. In time the whole object takes on its patina and what looks stark when new becomes “mellowed” and even becomes hard to see. 

side view

Once I saw enough of that sort of thing I had the confidence to dive in and make this furniture without worry about perfection. I’ve been working on my Craft Genealogy book recently; writing, rewriting and reviewing some of the source material for it. As I was thinking about this joined stool I remembered an article Daniel O’Hagan wrote in 1960 that to me relates to these concepts:

A friend has recently sent me a Swedish book on handcrafts reporting the flourishing increase in handmade articles in that industrialized country of seven million. 

The “human feel” has appeal in Sweden. More and more people are appreciating the intrinsic difference between a thing wrought and fashioned by fond, thoughtful, human hands, and a thing which rides on a conveyor belt with hundreds of others all precisely alike. 

I learned that in Sweden “Today, the handcraft organizations aim at preserving local variations as far as possible. In their artistic variety, handcraft products meet a need which often remains unfilled by industrially mass-produced articles. Many handcraft workers, men and women, are real artists in their line. Their output always bears an individual stamp – it is, in fact, praise of a handcraft weaver to say that she cannot weave two rugs alike.” 

This reminds me of the Mexican chair-maker who was asked to make a dozen chairs of the same pattern. He surprised his customer by quoting a higher price (per chair) instead of lower one. 

You could see these aspects of the joined stool as flaws or defects. I don’t, I see them just as I do the period examples I collect - evidence of the person behind the work and what was happening as they worked all those years ago. Jennie Alexander used to (half) jokingly refer to these glitches by saying “...then the cow got loose...” meaning the joiner had to put down his tools and run out chasing after the cow. What JA was driving at is a universal thing - interruptions happen. Our concentration gets broken by one thing or another. I looked at the calendar for this past Tuesday and thought “Great - I don’t have to be anywhere, I can work in the shop all day...” Then mid-morning we went out to vote early to avoid the lines and hysteria next week. That was only about a half-hour interruption. Back at the shop, I picked up where I left off. After lunch, I remembered I had to take my daughter to her violin lesson in the middle of the afternoon. By the time I came back from that, it was late enough that not only was I tired, but the light was fading. So I switched from fitting slats in one chair to cleaning up shaved parts for the next one. Then to sharpening a couple of tools, sweeping and generally getting ready for the next day’s work. I certainly have it easier than a period joiner - I don’t have to grow my own food, cut all that firewood by hand, make fencing, etc. But it’s pretty rare that I work four or five full days straight in the shop, much as I try to. 

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JOINED STOOL

joined stool Nov 2024

The stool’s for sale - my first in almost 3 years. All red oak. 

Height is 22”, seat is 10 1/4” x 16” - footprint is 14” x 14 1/2”. Linseed oil finish.
$1,000 plus shipping in the US. 

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CARVED PANEL

carved panel, red oak, 11” x 15 1/4”

The carved panel is based on, but not a direct copy of, the panels from a house that was in Bromley-by-Bow, now installed in the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. 

Red oak, 11” x 15 1/4”
$425 includes shipping in the US. 

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PS: The book Daniel O’Hagan referred to is Handcraft in Sweden, published in Stockholm in 1951. His family kindly gave me his copy - but a search just now for used book sites shows a number of copies around…somewhat tattered but an interesting read. Things change, things stay the same. It’s written in Swedish and English and talks a good bit about handwork as a response to overwhelming industrialization.

The closing line:

“The resulting evidence of skill and hard work gives a sense of self-respect, and of pleasure in doing things, that modern civilization cannot afford to overlook. Here lies the real guarantee of a flourishing future for handcrafts.”