Splintered Board Podcast: Recent Comments

Comment on Episode 22 - What is it That Inspires You?

Shannon — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:36:06 GMT

Rick,
Great question. I agree with Jeremy above that sometimes the wood inspires me. I get a lot of exotics from ebay and have no idea what to do with it until I get it in the mail. I open it and by looking at the figure I can see if used as a table leg where I can cut a curve that mimics the grain flow. Mostly though I get inspiration from my surroundings. When I am in a new town or in a restaurant I'll pay attention to the building facades or look closely at a chair I am sitting in in a restaurant. How is it constructed, how were the curved formed. Do that enough and you start to blend different elements together. Spend some time in the art and architecture section of your local bookstore and you will get a lifetime of ideas. I got more ideas in one trip to Chicago last year than anything. Feel very fortunate that you work in that city and look around at the details around the door ways and pediments on the buildings. Michigan Ave is a wealth of inspiration! All of this together gives me ideas.

Comment on Episode 23 - Announcement From Splintered Board

Shannon — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:28:21 GMT

Right on Rick. When we last spoke you hadn't sent the letter. Quick response and what an opportunity to clue us all in to a tool we don't see much here. I think the guy on the Great British Woodshop uses the Woodrat a lot. Check out those videos on The Woodworking Channel.

Comment on Episode 23 - Announcement From Splintered Board

Jeremy Kriewaldt — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:00:07 GMT

Great news.

Everyone that I have come across who uses the Woodrat reckons it is great. So I reckon you are on a winner.

Comment on Episode 22 - What is it That Inspires You?

Jeremy Kriewaldt — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:11:24 GMT

Rick

You asked where woodworkers who listen to SB get the time for their own projects and where they get their inspiration.

My main inspiration is the wood itself. I live in Australia, and we have some astonishing native timber, colours that blow your mind, weird grain and really hard.

I have a stock of wood of all kinds of species (but almost all Aussie hardwood) which sits around my shop and outside as well. I wait for the wood to tell me that it has a project that it wants to do.

Even mdf and ply can talk. I have had mdf tell me that the project that needs to be made is a mdf box for the kids' toys or a new jig.

So I'm not a wood whisperer, but a wood listener.

And I get the time for my own projects when the wood is shrieking at me that the project needs to be done. I am lucky that my wife knows that the projects that she wants me to do will be done better when I stop that wood screaming at me about another project!

Seriously, I suppose that the time comes for every project but when your project is dominating your thoughts and you know it has to be done and that you are ready to do it, then you have to be selfish and go ahead and do it. All creative activities involve a degree of selfishness - as I said above, my wife (and now my kids) know that the projects they want me to do for them won't be nearly as good as they might be if there is another project that I have to do first. If I am upset because I am doing a project I don't want to do, it isn't going to turn out well.

Also the wood understands - it tends to tell me that the project that needs to have priority is the one that the family wants done. But every now and then, the wood shouts out says "Your turn, go ahead and make it; we're ready to help." Guess what, if you don't wait until the wood is ready to help, there is no point starting.

Comment on Episode 23 - Announcement From Splintered Board

Rick Waters — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 15:12:35 GMT

Hey, thanks Markus!
It would help if I could spell!

-Rick

Comment on Episode 23 - Announcement From Splintered Board

Markus — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 11:24:51 GMT

Hi.
Check the Woodrat link, it' not working.

Btw. Like your podcast. Keep up the good work!

/Markus

Comment on Episode 21 - Artistic License in Design

Eric — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 08:14:02 GMT

Man, I'm such a non-designer! I tried to be a good boy. I paused your podcast before the interview began and tried to look at Droog. But I just couldn't! Aargh - I'd rather plane a board against the grain with a dull plane iron than look at "art" or out-of-the-box stuff.

No offense to anyone who likes it - diff'rent strokes, right?

Anyway, I'm going back to the podcast now...

Comment on Episode 21 - Artistic License in Design

Neil — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 14:48:23 GMT

Hey Shannon.....if we look at Federal from the idea of just the eagle and olive branches, throw in a eagle carving or 2, then OK. But if we Realize that the Seymour's came over from England with many other skilled craftsman to be considered the mainstays of American Federal Cabinetmakers is an indication that they were interpreting an existing style here. Maybe we can call that the Georgian Style. We can see fans on German cabinets in the 1780's, we can even see inlay banding on William and Mary pieces. The idea of placing an eagle in an oval inlay is just a carry through of the Italian marquetuers specifically Maggiolini. Drum tables with tapered legs, cuffs, inlay, spade and marlboro legs, come from Europe.

I will say this thought......maybe because we were late to the neo-classical party, no country refined the interpretation of Neo-Classical Furniture better then the the American cabinetmakers of the American Federal Period. I guess just having won the Revolution and having some affluence, we refreshed old designs, produced our own "decorative arts" to our interiors and called it American. It is the collective psyche we needed at the time.

Comment on Episode 21 - Artistic License in Design

Shannon — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 21:41:55 GMT

No unique American furniture style. What about the Federal period. It is my understanding that this was our founding father's way of thumbing their collective noses at the British and creating a distinctive american style. Am I wrong here? That is what the folks at the Winterthur museum told me.

Comment on Episode 21 - Artistic License in Design

Rick Waters — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 12:13:31 GMT

Yup, you're absolutely right. 11,000 euros for a few chairbacks. A little pricey for an original idea that you could 'steal'.