In the days leading up to and surrounding the holidays, I started to focus my thinking and daydreaming on the design for my new shop stool. I cast a wide net and pulled in several ideas. I tried to explain the process of elimination in my post HERE. Until I realized I was looking for inspiration inside the "box" labeled Stool . . .
____________(insert your own fecal matter joke here) ___________!
. . . . and I find good design comes from (cliche) outside the box thinking.
I have developed a small but obsessive idea about designing a piece of furniture made precisely for the environment its going to occupy. Not just in ergonomic terms of use, and not just in the simple height/width/depth numbers. But something that "belongs" in the space and is as organic and natural a feel as finding a lichen covered rock along a forest trail. David Mathias and his great book "Poems of Wood and Light planted this seed in my mind. (I wrote about it HERE) and I have been slowly exploring the concept in drawings and beginning to apply the concept to my home.
So after looking at hundreds of Google Search images of stools, I backed off and rethought my approach. I was trying to cram a stool design I liked into my shop, but why not take a shop design I like and cram it into a stool instead. . . .
I wanted something iconic and recognisable. Of late, especially on the internet, there is nothing more iconic and recognisable that the Roubo Workbench. Slab built, laminated split top, leg vise or plane stop, whatever flavor you like em, they are the hot, must have shop accessory for the new generation. To be honest, there are times Id like to upgrade my bench to one too.
Even more than all the choices of top and work holding, there is one thing I think of that seems to consistently have that "Roubo" feel for me when it comes to looking at Roubo benches. The iconic touch is the through double tenon.
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| This picture was borrowed from Chris Schwarzs blog at Lost Art Press, The original post is found HERE. |
Im still playing with details, so there are some things about the sketch that will make it into the final product and some that wont. The real refinement of an idea comes at the bench. I realize there will be some issues with grain direction and the through dovetailed tenons, but I plan to work that out based on what the stock gives me when I cut for the seat.
