{"id":54655,"date":"2025-01-29T03:54:21","date_gmt":"2025-01-29T03:54:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/entertainment\/art\/working-wood-sofa-edition-lost-art-press\/"},"modified":"2025-01-29T03:54:21","modified_gmt":"2025-01-29T03:54:21","slug":"working-wood-sofa-edition-lost-art-press","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=54655","title":{"rendered":"Working Wood: Sofa Edition – Lost Art Press"},"content":{"rendered":"


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As I write this, in Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia, hundreds of attendees and a dozen or so presenters are enjoying the waning hours of the 27th annual \u201cWorking Wood in the 18th Century<\/a>\u201d conference. This year\u2019s theme was \u201cTo Furnish a Town: High, Low, and In-Between,\u201d and I was honored to be asked to reproduce for it a piece in the museum collection, a late 18th-\/early 19th-century dovetailed blanket chest.<\/p>\n

And I was very much looking forward to the other presentations, including CW joiners Bill Pavlak and John Peeler talking about the evolution of style and construction on drop-front desks and dining tables. Curator Tara Chicirda on how 18th-century homes were furnished (and how we outfit those same spaces today). Conservator Chris Swan on how furniture surface decoration and finish has changed over time. And lots more. I love this stuff! (Heck \u2013 I even bought a new car in large part so I didn\u2019t have to worry about mechanical issues while driving from Cincinnati to Williamsburg \u2013 that\u2019s how eager I was to go!)<\/p>\n

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Check out the wave on those sweetgum end boards!<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I\u2019m not sure if the CW folk consider this chest by an unknown maker as representative as \u201clow\u201d or \u201cin-between,\u201d and I didn\u2019t think to ask. (But because I\u2019ve never met a shell carving I wanted to carve or a marquetry panel I was slavering to make, it\u2019s safe to assume they asked me as a representative of the vernacular, so not high.) Once I got a closer look at the chest, I categorized it as a \u201chigh low,\u201d or \u201clow in-between.\u201d The joinery and simple design was well executed, and the dovetails were evenly spaced and well cut\u2026but no city joiner would have chosen sweetgum (Liquidambar styraciflua<\/em>) as one of the primary woods for this piece. You know how we often say, \u201cWood hates you?\u201d Well sweetgum loathes the very thought of your existence. <\/p>\n

The maker used Southern yellow pine for the front, back, top and plinth; the sides and bottom are sweetgum. Notice the dovetails pulling apart at the sides. That\u2019s the sweetgum working its warped magic. These dovetails are all wedged (the wedges are in the middle of each pin). In most species, that would lock the joints together for generations. I suspect these started pulling apart not terribly long after construction\u2026because I got the same wavy and exciting drying in my sweetgum boards within a day of surfacing it \u2013 after it had been carefully dried, allowed to acclimate, flattened in stages to allow for moisture exchange and to accommodate movement, and generally treated like I would care for a sickly kitten: carefully and lovingly. Then the kitten poops on you.<\/p>\n

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I had to work around the splits \u2013 there was but one slab. What you see is all you get!<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I was lucky to find a wide slab of sweetgum at C.R. Muterspaw<\/a> (it\u2019s not typically a commercially available wood), and Shea Alexander of Alexander Brothers<\/a> tracked down, cut and dried some gorgeous SYP for me. I needed stuff wide enough for single boards for the front, back and ends \u2013 those big boards were a lot easier to find 225 years ago, I\u2019m guessing (or not\u2026the original maker scabbed on narrow pieces to the top and bottom to make up the overall width \u2013 but maybe that was just poor planning).<\/p>\n

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This was a big pine tree; the planer is a 20\u2033. And the shop smelled like a Southern forest for days afterward (yum!).<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The biggest problem I expected from the pine was sap, and of course I got it. I had to wipe my saw down with mineral spirits after every couple of cuts. But I also had a little trouble with the SYP splitting \u2013 so I incorporated that into my planned stage show. I cut and fit all the joinery in our shop, kerfed the pins for the wedges on all but the fourth corner, and cut the plinth pieces and moulding blanks for the underside of the lid (the original had some kind of moulding nailed on around the sides and front, though it\u2019s now missing). I\u2019d finish up the kerfs on stage, then assemble the chest\u2026and enjoy the audience gasps as the SYP split while I tapped in the wedges. I figured if I anticipated the split, it might not happen \u2013 a reverse psychology play, if you will, on \u201cman plans, the gods laugh.\u201d<\/p>\n

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I was so close to ready!<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But gosh did the gods laugh\u2026<\/p>\n

Two weeks ago, as I was finishing up the prep on my chest pieces and making lists of the tools to pack for the trip (in my Dutch tool chest, of course!), I slipped on an icy Covington city street and snapped my ankle in three places. So instead of driving my new car to Williamsburg, I\u2019m sitting on my couch (crutches within grabbing distance), with my ankle elevated above my heart and recovering from surgery. (Good thing I\u2019ve plenty of editing to keep me busy in the coming weeks!)<\/p>\n

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Thanks, Zach, for letting me steal your IG snap (but did you have to take one where all my wrinkles are showing?!)<\/em>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I wasn\u2019t able to do the presentation I\u2019d planned (obviously), but I did manage to cobble together a slide show with voiceover \u2013 thank goodness I took lots of pictures of both the original chest and my own build process \u2013 and the folk at CW made it work (thank you to everyone there!). Then I Zoomed in for the Saturday morning session, and took questions afterward. (It\u2019s weird to watch yourself on screen.)<\/p>\n

I plan to get back to the chest build in a few months \u2013 I hate leaving things unfinished. I just have to hope the sweetgum pieces haven\u2019t in the meantime warped into hyperbolic paraboloids. But I rather expect them to.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, I\u2019ll be here on the couch, writing and editing. The only ones happy about all this are Olivia and Toby. <\/p>\n

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As I write this, in Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia, hundreds of attendees and a dozen or so presenters are enjoying the waning hours of the 27th annual \u201cWorking Wood in the 18th Century\u201d conference. 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