Luxury

My lovely wife, Erika, has been laying her clothes on the bathroom floor for the last few weeks. No, she hasn’t gone insane, at least not in the traditional sense of the word.

When we built our home eight years ago, we added a few “luxury” things, like a heated floor system in the master bath. We had some problems with the system initially, so we didn’t use it much until this year.

So, I got up this morning to 12 degree weather, snow and ice everywhere, and winds of 30mph. After taking a ridiculously hot shower – the kind that takes skin off, I hop out to slide into warm socks…and jeans…and shirt. There is very little in this world that is better than the feeling of being engulfed by warmth, especially on a morning like this one.

I felt bad having splurged on a heated floor and the electricity it consumes, until I remember that my lovely wife, Erika, has yet to turn on the heater this year! The wood stove is working overtime for sure. Tabby, our cat, really appreciates the heated floor too.

While it seems like an unnecessary cost, the actual cost of running the heated floor is about the same as leaving on a table lamp. This versus the cost of running a heating system in a house makes the heated floor seem like a good, not so luxurious, item to splurge on.

While many people consider our furniture a luxury, I never have. I consider it a good value. To me this means something that lasts, is appreciated often, and has more value for the purchaser than the cost of the item itself.

The story of sycamore

For years and years, our founder, Greg Gloor, worked with a lumber mill to purchase quarter-sawn sycamore. Above, that's a picture of what quarter-sawn sycamore looks like at its best. Between us and another manufacturer in Vermont, the mill hoped to be able to sell enough of this not-very-popular wood to make drying it in quantity a profitable operation.

However, sycamore is hard to dry. It is prone to what is called “blue stain”—an infection in the wood that cause the surface of the board to turn, essentially, blue—and a couple of loads of stained wood killed the market. Stained wood of this type becomes virtually useless, as it isn’t pretty enough for anything but painting. The mill couldn’t get the prices they needed as a result and stopped the production of quarter-sawn sycamore.

We went through a period of time trying to cobble together enough stock from other suppliers to keep using it as a secondary wood in our drawers and an accent wood on other pieces, but only about five percent of the mills in the entire country quarter-saw lumber, making it very difficult to secure the quantity we need at a price we could afford.

We tried valiantly, but in the end, we had to give up. Ash is cut by many more mills and is competitively priced so finally, the Board decided to make the switch. We’d been phasing out the sycamore-sided pieces over the last year or so, but it has been taking too long so we finally decided to sell them off all at once.

We've also got a few pieces that have discontinued fabrics on them or that have been in the showrooms for a while. Click over to the floor model list and see what treasures you can unearth for your home!

Martinis

I read a very interesting article in The Washington Post by Jason Wilson about the origins and evolution of the martini. While the subject of martinis is not top of mind for me, I found this all very insightful and so, so true.

My father is one of those who began drinking gin martinis in college, you know, back in the 1950’s, smoking a pipe, wearing a coat with the patches on the elbows. It was the rage of the time. Later, when I was becoming of legal age, I fondly remember mixing him drinks where I would splash vermouth over the top only, or just say the words over the glass.

I remember sitting around with my father on one of the many fishing trips to Chincoteague Island, VA. The day was done, and we were regaling in our daily pack of lies, otherwise known as the fish stories of the day. He and I sat around drinking “martinis” made his way…no vermouth. I thought I would die. Talk about harsh.

In the article, Derek Brown says “when people finally experience a martini with unique and artisanal ingredients, it makes a world of difference”. The whole point of the article is that we Americans have somehow managed to stray from the original composition and intention of the martini.

I think that the furniture world has managed to stray from tried and true practices. When I show people a dovetail or mortise and tenon joint, they are just amazed this sort of joint is still created. The concept of wood from the trees stops people for a moment. When I say walnut, I don’t mean a walnut color, I mean a walnut tree – as furniture makers for centuries have intended it to be. So mix a real drink, and get some real furniture.

Luddites Anyone

I got into this debate with the twenty something, now officially thirty something, marketing director of ours (Hugs and kisses, Alison). Silly really, but it typifies this ongoing …well, let’s just call it a difference in the way we look at life. She was paying a bill through the company of hers with a fist full of cash. I was curious why she’d choose to use up all her cash rather than pay with a check or some other arrangements with the accounting people. Then it began. The obvious was pointed out…just go to the ATM. Duh! When I pointed out that I did not have an ATM card, and had less interest of getting an ATM card, and that I prefer to go inside the bank and hand my transactions to an actual person, with an actual pulse, I was accused of being a Luddite.

Curt, one of my partners, quickly tried to intervene, only to confess that he too shared my lack of a banking card, and preferred dealing with someone with a pulse rather than something that beeps and burps at you. He took the next barrage of scrutiny, only to slink off slightly bruised. Thanks for taking one for the team, Curt. Us Luddites got to stick together, don’t you know.

The other day we had an oops in the shop, and the solution was to shave the face of the entire cabinet back about ¼”. Not a difficult thing to do in theory, but to actually do it is very difficult. The only way to really do this was by hand...enter Kevin Parker, one of our craftsmen. Kevin has a real passion for hand planes, and all things in the craft that are old timey. So, Kevin was call upon, and he proudly marched over and whittled away on the face of this cabinet for an hour or so, successfully saving both the cabinet and hours of additional time.

Think about this for a minute. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars of equipment in our shop, and the best solution to this and many other problems was a $25 hand plane. Who’s the Luddite now, Miss marketing director smarty pants? I’ll bet this internet thing is just a passing fancy, too.

Why furniture?

It always so interesting to ask craftsmen how they decided to do what they do. The other day in our showroom, I met a man who makes guitars for a living (an honest to goodness luthier!). The story behind that choice must be just fascinating.

I've asked our craftsmen this question and they all have their own stories, like the craftsman who works for us who comes from a family of cabinetmakers.

I asked a similar question of Adam King, a furniture maker in Olney, Illinois, and he said the following:

It's that compulsion that drives me to strive for a closer connection to my materials and my heritage in this craft. It's that compulsion that has me exploring new ways to bring a very real emotional connection to you through my designs and my stories. It's that compulsion that's moving me in a direction that is honest and true to my passions and talents so that I can offer you the best work I could possibly create.

Go read the rest. It's worth it.

Pop Up TV Cabinets

We just had a nice little mention on Jeri Dansky's blog site. She was discussing various pop up TV cabinets, and seems to like ours quite a bit. What is shown is a solid Mahogany Glasgow credenza with art glass doors we made in house. Greg Gloor is the designer of this cabinet, which has been quite popular.

There are various ways to hide TV's. I own a Library Entertainment Center, which Erika and I just love. The bookcases slide to the left and right over the rear bookcases to reveal the TV. Check it out on the web site - www.hardwoodartisans.com in the entertainment center area.

So, I have been doing a lot of work from my home lately, specifically AutoCAD drawings. It's nice to be able to concentrate, and the complexity of the work dictates a lot of focus on the overall project. I work at least twice as fast at home as when I'm in the office. There is a lot to be said about working in some peace and quiet.

The other night I was working on a drawing I needed to get done, and had spent about 45 minutes to an hour working feverishly on it. I was almost finished, when my cat, Woody (what else would I name him?) jumped up on the table and laid down on the keyboard. When I tried to extricate him from my workspace, he hit the power button on the laptop. Everything lost. My boy, my boy. I love him, but just wanted to kill him at that point.

Washington Spaces

I met a very interesting person today by the name of Jennifer Sergent. She is a reporter for Washington Spaces Magazine, one of the magazines we advertise in.

We found some common ground in that she and I went to the same high school - Langley - though several (read many) years apart. Also, she has a blog - washingtonspaces.com/blog like I do.

I found the time with her refreshing, like talking with an old friend. It's nice to meet someone new who has shared similar experiences at some other time. It was as if I had known her for years. Have you ever had that happen to you?

Did you see us in the Examiner this week?

When I said in my last entry that I am a master craftsman, I did not expect people to take notice so quickly! If you’re looking for some quality reading material, let me suggest a pair of articles featured in the DC Examiner and the Baltimore Examiner.

The first, in the DC Examiner, is an interview I did about our furniture donation initiative with ACTS, which I discussed in a previous entry. Sorry if it sounds choppy… I only had three minutes to interview!

The second, in the Baltimore Examiner, quotes Alison--that thirty-something Marketing Director of ours--about our Murphy and wall beds. Speaking of which, last weekend’s Post ad featured the Library Wall Bed. I think they make excellent guest beds… nothing beats a real mattress for comfort, not to mention the inherent space-saving features of being able to fold a bed into a wall.

We typically sell a lot of these beds around the holidays to families expecting out-of-town visitors, and I have to imagine other furniture retailers experience a similar phenomenon. I’ve also seen some pretty innovative guest solutions out there, though in my house we just put rocks under the mattress to get guests to leave early. In your house, where do your guests go?

"I'm somebody now!"

I like to think of myself as being good at what I do. I work for a company that has been in business for 32 years, and I’ve been a part of it for the last 22. And yet every day I learn something new as a woodworker. In this field, it is very hard to be a “know-it-all,” no matter how hard I may try. So, as you can see, today when I make a piece of furniture for a customer, there are many things--collected over my 25 years as a woodworker--that I take into account. You might even consider me an expert furniture maker… even a master craftsman.

My extremely talented Marketing Director recently coerced me into writing down some of my sage knowledge in the form of an article, which we submitted to DesignLine magazine. Today the mail arrived, and with it came the magazine, with my published article on pages 16 – 17! “The new phone book’s here! The new phone book’s here! I’m somebody now!”

So, what do you think? Did you learn something? Bonus points if you can guess which movie I’ve quoted.

Dining: Linnaea-Style!

Wow! We’ve received a lot of interest in a product we’ve not even debuted yet… our Linnaea dining set! We’ve already drawn up plans for a table, and we’re working on the chairs as I type. Here, you can see two of the table drawings. It’ll be at least 4 weeks until we even have a picture of this never-before-seen item!

However, we do have one Linnaea dining item you CAN see now: the Linnaea credenza. This great piece is diminutive in size and works great as a small server or even as a living room cabinet which stylistically matches other items in the Linnaea Collection.

Do you have any other ideas for items we ought to add to the Linnaea Collection? If so, please leave a comment below!

Linnaea Updates

Dance, monkey, dance. The stress test worked.

Jason and me with "the slider" cabinet. The top doors slide to the center or the far left and right to reveal a jewelry drawer in the top middle. The drawer is on metal glides for full extension and is fully lined with a complete jewelry organizer. The drawers are curved fronts, like the case and top. These pieces should be in the showroom within two weeks.

Making Your Linnaea Dresser Be All It Can Be

I'm working on the pedestals for the Linnaea cabinets. We have been making decisions on the size of it, and it has been growing progressively. Seems like each time we work with it, the pedestal grows about 1/2".

The pedestal has legs that are set at angles to the case. The legs are actually 5-sided, with a beveled interior area for the skirts to connect. They are 8" high, and step out about 3 1/2" in two directions. This is fairly involved as far as pedestals go.

The concern over structure here is pretty big. Many people are not kind to their furnishings, myself included, and I have a genuine concern of these legs getting sheared off from the piece, getting dragged, hit with large objects, dropped, etc. I'm always thinking of the worst case scenario when I design and build furniture. We originally were going to use a metal corner bracket to help support the joint. We found that the screw needed to provide the majority of the strength would need to run through the intersection of the two skirts, and would actually diminish the joint's integrity by possibly fracturing the glued joint. If you have ever run a screw into a piece of wood and had the wood split, imagine running a screw into the intersection of three pieces of wood. Hard to imagine a good outcome here.

We decided that best approach to the problem was to do what they would have done in 1960, a good old-fashioned corner block that was glued and screwed to the skirts. You can see the difference between the metal corner bracket and the corner block in the photo. The effect is that the skirts become much more rigid, and thereby don't allow any flex in the leg joint. The real test will be when I stand on top of the chest to "stress test" the pedestal. I'll keep you posted.

Quarter Sawn Lumber

I was asked to write about wood, or more specifically, the way wood is cut. This opens up a whole bunch of doors, but for the purposes of this blog, we’re only talking about the way our lumber is cut for our uses.

There is a much better description of the way wood is cut in an article I was reading, so rather than bore you with my description, check it out. I will explain the basics here.

Plain sawn lumber is just as it sounds. It is cut flatly from the log, and is the most common way wood is cut. The net effect is a “cathedral” type grain pattern that is very pleasing aesthetically. Our cherry, red oak, birch, maple, walnut, and mahogany are all plain sawn.

Quarter sawn lumber is wood that has been taken from the tree very differently. The tree is first quartered, or cut into four sections. The boards are then taken from the tree in one of several different ways. The net effect is a straight grain, often times creating interesting patterns known as ray flecks.

There are two basic reasons why wood would be quartered, either for stability or looks. When you quarter lumber, it becomes more stable than plain sawn wood. It will expand and contract primarily the thickness of the board, not the width like plain sawn. The look of quartered lumber, or specifically the ray flecks, is the desired effect. It gives the lumber depth and interest in a different way.

The reason we carry quarter sawn white oak and plain sawn red oak is largely based on history. Quartered white oak would have been the wood of choice during the arts and crafts movement, the original one, a hundred years ago. As a result, many of our customers own antiques that they want to match or compliment in some way, and the quartered white oak just foots the bill. Red oak has traditionally been plain sawn with large, dramatic cathedrals in the grain patterns, so much like the expectations surrounding white oak, there are similar demands for plain sawn red oak instead of quartered.

You can get any log quartered if you like. I have worked with quartered cherry, maple, sycamore, red oak, white oak, and several others. Some types of wood have more drama in them when they are quartered than some others.

What is the best wood for you? I get asked this a lot. I get asked a lot of questions. What most people mean is “This is how I live, how many kids I have, how often I move, and what I want the piece for. Which wood is best here?” The answer is always the same within the varieties of the hardwoods we offer, the durability, longevity, soundness of each wood is comparable, so……………..the best wood for you is the one you like, the one that makes you happy. This sounds too easy!

Post Show

So, I survived the IWF show in Atlanta. As usual, it was a very long trip. We flew out on Thursday night, getting in around 11:00. When we got to the hotel, which we booked months and months in advance, we received “suites”. Actually, we got rooms set up for meetings with no beds in them! So, what else is a guy to do at 11:30 at night in a strange town with no bed? We went to the bar and shot some pool and drank beer for two hours. We all (six of us) ended up sleeping on cot sized roll-away beds! Nice.

Friday was the usual walking around for 8 or 9 hours, and then meeting in the lounge to discuss the day and the next plan of action. I specifically went to the third building of three, the hardware building, looking for very specific things like leveling feet and lighting and knobs and touch-up kits. Not all real exciting stuff, but hard to find, even for us.

I was so excited to find exactly what I had come for – a new lighting supplier. The guy makes solid metal casings with the new LED lamps, and will custom-make the wiring harnesses to our specifications!! These lamps were really, really nice stuff-- expensive, but nice. Best of all, it is all made in the US, in Miami, Florida no less. So, after finding this guy and spending an hour with him, I felt like I could just enjoy the show, which I did.

Another thing that I pursued was finding college contacts. At the IWF, they will often times have student furniture on display. Assorted colleges will have booths set up. This is sort of a recruiting practice. I met up with the Virginia Tech Wood program. We sponsored a student this summer from Tech, and it worked out well. He was a delight to have here. My hope is I can find the “next generation” craftsman to take over this thing in 20 years.

Friday night was a surreal adventure. I found myself at a Mai Tai restaurant with my partners and I being served smoked steak. And yes, back to the cot roll-away bed! Saturday was a follow up day, which it always has been. I took all my partners to show them the lighting find. We all agreed this was the thing……..winner, winner, chicken dinner! I was shown three specific machines that they were considering, and an AutoCAD based drawing program that we are considering implementing on the sales floors.

Out of time and out of energy, back to the airport we go. During our lunch/dinner, as a group we sorted out and designed a new dining chair to go with the new Linnaea collection. There is something bigger and almost magical about the trips my partners and I have taken over the years. Call it synergy, call it cohesiveness, I call it the cumulative brain power of 150 years of experience. This is what ultimately makes these trips worth doing for me.