Woodwright's Shop: A Practical Guide to Traditional Woodcraft
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Book Overview
Roy Underhill brings to woodworking the intimate relationship with wood that craftsmen enjoyed in the days before power tools. Combining historical background, folklore, alternative technololgy, and humor, he provides both a source of general information and a detailed introduction to traditional woodworking. Beginning with a guide to trees and tools, The Woodwright's Shop includes chapters on gluts and mauls, shaving horses, rakes, chairs, weaving wood, hay forks, dough bowls, lathes, blacksmithing, dovetails, panel-frame construction, log houses, and timber-frame construction. More than 330 photographs illustrate the text.
For more than twenty-five years, Roy Underhill has taught the techniques of traditional hand-tool woodworking. In five books and on his popular, long-running PBS series, The Woodwright's Shop, America's leading authority on old-time woodcraft has inspired millions to take up chisel and plane. Designed for both woodworking novices and for more seasoned woodworkers looking for enjoyable projects, the books feature step-by-step instructions, complete with easy-to-follow photographs and measured drawings.
Roy Underhill is the former master housewright at Colonial Williamsburg. He created The Woodwright's Shop, one of the first television programs devoted to woodworking, in 1979. The series is produced by the University of North Carolina Center for Public Television and has aired nationally since 1981. Roy is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and holds a master's degree from Duke University. He lives in Williamsburg, Virginia.
The Woodwright's Shop
A Practical Guide to Traditional Woodcraft
Features a guide to trees and tools as well as chapters on gluts and mauls, shaving horses, chairs, lathes, blacksmithing, log houses, and more.
The Woodwright's Companion
Exploring Traditional Woodcraft
Includes chapters on helves and handles, saws, the search for the whetstone quarry, hurdles, whimmy diddles, planes, window sashes, and pit sawing.
The Woodwright's Workbook
Further Explorations in Traditional Woodcraft
With step-by-step instructions for tool chests, workbenches, lathes, and historical reproductions of items for the home. Roy also explores building barns, boats, and even colonial fortresses.
The Woodwright's Eclectic Workshop
Popular projects include the Adirondack chair, tavern table, folding ladder, rocking horse, lathe, and kayak, all illustrated with photographs and measured drawings.
The Woodwright's Apprentice
Twenty Favorite Projects from The Woodwright's Shop
Begins with directions for building a workbench, then builds new skills--from frame construction to dovetailing, turning, steam-bending, and carving--with each successive project.
For more than twenty-five years, Roy Underhill has taught the techniques of traditional hand-tool woodworking. In five books and on his popular, long-running PBS series, The Woodwright's Shop, America's leading authority on old-time woodcraft has inspired millions to take up chisel and plane. Designed for both woodworking novices and for more seasoned woodworkers looking for enjoyable projects, the books feature step-by-step instructions, complete with easy-to-follow photographs and measured drawings.
Roy Underhill is the former master housewright at Colonial Williamsburg. He created The Woodwright's Shop, one of the first television programs devoted to woodworking, in 1979. The series is produced by the University of North Carolina Center for Public Television and has aired nationally since 1981. Roy is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and holds a master's degree from Duke University. He lives in Williamsburg, Virginia.
The Woodwright's Shop
A Practical Guide to Traditional Woodcraft
Features a guide to trees and tools as well as chapters on gluts and mauls, shaving horses, chairs, lathes, blacksmithing, log houses, and more.
The Woodwright's Companion
Exploring Traditional Woodcraft
Includes chapters on helves and handles, saws, the search for the whetstone quarry, hurdles, whimmy diddles, planes, window sashes, and pit sawing.
The Woodwright's Workbook
Further Explorations in Traditional Woodcraft
With step-by-step instructions for tool chests, workbenches, lathes, and historical reproductions of items for the home. Roy also explores building barns, boats, and even colonial fortresses.
The Woodwright's Eclectic Workshop
Popular projects include the Adirondack chair, tavern table, folding ladder, rocking horse, lathe, and kayak, all illustrated with photographs and measured drawings.
The Woodwright's Apprentice
Twenty Favorite Projects from The Woodwright's Shop
Begins with directions for building a workbench, then builds new skills--from frame construction to dovetailing, turning, steam-bending, and carving--with each successive project.
Format:Paperback
Language:English
ISBN:0807840823
ISBN13:9780807840825
Release Date:October 1981
Publisher:University of North Carolina Press
Length:216 Pages
Weight:1.49 lbs.
Dimensions:0.5" x 8.0" x 11.0"
Customer Reviews
6 ratings
Loved the show,love the book
Published by quinna67 , 3 years ago
Very happy I ran across this, I gave it 5 based on my love of the show and the deep root awl included.
Fascinating
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 16 years ago
I guess it's time I wrote a review, now that the covers are about to fall off of the book. Few books in my shop library are as practically useless for me yet so fascinating as this first Woodwright book by Underhill. I will never actually make anything he displays in here, but I've made everyone of them in my head at least once a winter for a couple of decades. If you've never seen his program on PBS, then please look for it. In my area it's shown Saturday afternoons. You'll be in nostalgia heaven. Both on the show and in his books, no electricity is allowed, much less power tools. Start here then get the other five.
Life-changing!
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 16 years ago
I first saw Roy Underhill on a local PBS station back in the early 1980s. Instantly, I knew that this was the kind of woodworking for me. Screaming routers, finger-chopping table saws and jointers, and multi-horsepower lathes seemed not just dangerous but downright obsolete after witnessing Roy's talents. Honestly, who needs modern woodworking technology when the old methods are clearly better in so many ways? Better for your health and the health of your bank account, and better for the environment. Roy's wonderful series of woodworking books tell you everything you need to get started. They will positively change your woodworking, and your life. Thanks to Roy's books, and others, like Dunbar's _Restoring, Tuning & Using Classic Woodworking Tools_, power tool woodworkers look at my woodworking projects in awe... those amazing and elegant hand-cut dovetails, those silky-smooth hand-planed surfaces, those sweet touches that set my work apart as obviously hand-made. Once you've mastered hand-tool woodworking, you see that the products of woodworking machines stand out as brutal and clumsy. Guys, do not hesitate to purchase the entire series of Roy's woodworking books!
Woodwright Shop book
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 17 years ago
I bought this book for my husband for Christmas, as he loves this show and the shows are not out on DVD yet. He loves the book and can't put it down. He advised it is very easy to read and understand.
What??? Only two reviews???
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 20 years ago
This is one of the finest things ever written! I sincerely hope that a copy of this book lives on the shelf of everyone who has a love for tools and wood and what happens when the two come together. Underhill gives us a look into the world of real hand tool woodworking - no electricity, please. "Start with an axe and a tree and make first one thing and then another until you have a house and everything in it." It can be (almost) that simple, but you have to restore a fractured culture first, and also learn to speak the language of trees and wood and steel. This book will accomplish both those aims. Underhill, former Master Housewright at Colonial Williamsburg, did the amazing hat trick of turning something as offbeat and esoteric as pre-industrial woodworking into a highly successful career, and became a beloved personality and celebrity in the process. When you read his books, you'll know how he did it. Instantly, you get the sense that his deep affection for his trade, and the trades that support it, illuminates his life. He "sees" things, he doesn't just look. Like ripples in a stream allude to rocks below the surface, he looks at the bark of a tree and understands what lies within - twisted firewood or beautiful furniture? Dissecting an old piece of furniture or part of a house tells you about the tools that made it, and the men who used the tools, and the community they lived in, and what their lives were like. But all of this could be ponderous and self absorbed if it weren't infused front to back with an infectious sense of humor and a Tom Sawyer/Peter Pan view of the world, where if we're lucky we'll all get to run away and be pirates together. Poetic, lyrical, sad, happy, this book has it all. A true classic from an amazingly talented person. Maybe the 60's hippy culture did ONE thing right - it gave us Roy Underhill, boy genius, and set him loose upon a (hopefully) grateful world. His books, and the first two particularly, make a perfect gift for that tired, world weary person in your life who is thinking that there is something missing in his or her work, that their long days are filled with meaningless seeking, and who might like to turn their hands to something slower, calmer, more beautiful, and decidedly valuable for a change.
If you only buy one book on the subject make it this!
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 26 years ago
This remarkable book by the even more remarkable Roy Underhill will inspire you to forget the breathing and ear protection apparatus and get out your hand tools! It has to be the singularily most inspiring woodworking book available. Enjoy the soft smells and quiet sounds of real craftmanship. The rest of the series is indispensible also. And if you enjoy this book you'll also love the book "Restoring Tuning & Using Classic Woodworking Tools" by Michael Dunbar. A MUST for any true craftsman at heart.
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