Furniture

[72gmc]

I’m enjoying this with coffee and a bit of workshop envy.

[claritycycler]

Great vid! Seeing this level of work is truly amazing; I think to truly appreciate his skills one has to have at least a basic understanding/experience/knowledge of furniture building. Come on Dan, really, only a little bit of shop envy?

[rec head]

I wasn't expecting biscuits.

[j44ke]

Ishitani is a great YouTube channel. His work with a chisel is incredible.

[72gmc]

Come on Dan, really, only a little bit of shop envy?

I confess to rewinding 30 seconds more than once so I could focus on the tool or machine he was using instead of the wood he was working.

[claritycycler]

I wasn't expecting biscuits.

Biscuits are used for alignment purposes only, initially they were thought to strengthen joints but it is now accepted they don't, the glue used is the structural bond.

[rec head]

I understand biscuits and have one. I just didn't expect them in this case. His process and tool choices are interesting.

[j44ke]

I understand biscuits and have one. I just didn't expect them in this case. His process and tool choices are interesting.

Yes. A unique ability to move back and forth between traditional techniques and modern machinery, and he has some pretty amazing machinery - not new but restored and well cared for.



I found an article on him at one point but I can't locate it now. He went to a furniture making trade school and then apprenticed at a furniture builder. At the time of the article he was in his late 30's but that was several years ago (ah located his age - he's 49 now). Japan has a strong apprenticeship ethos obviously, but I also think a lot of the high-craft makers are aging or dying out without anyone to take up the chisel (as it were.) Hard to convince someone to put in the years of apprenticeship. There is another YouTube channel by an Australian guy who moved to Japan with his Japanese wife, and they bought and restored one of the abandoned houses now common in the Japanese countryside. Their carpenter was 70 years old and brought along his son as his apprentice. I guess when the carpenter retires at 90, the son will take over at 60 or so.

[72gmc]

There is another YouTube channel by an Australian guy who moved to Japan with his Japanese wife, and they bought and restored one of the abandoned houses now common in the Japanese countryside.

Tokyo Llama. His videos are interesting and sometimes sad, at least when I imagine the once-thriving communities that are silent now.

[Mabouya]

His videos are interesting and sometimes sad, at least when I imagine the once-thriving communities that are silent now.

Sad, but you have to wonder if the Japanese themselves aren't at least partly to blame - if they weren't so insular, even xenophobic at times, they would have had more in-migration, which would have refreshed the demographics and surely resulted in a younger population as a whole.

[72gmc]

[dcama5]

I hadn't seen this thread, but here are a couple end tables I just built for our daughter and her husband. They are both on faculty at the University of Houston and have a home there with two of our grandchildren. We will visit after Christmas and deliver these. They are made of Sapele which is an African mahogany.

Those are Japanese hand planes lined up on the shelf behind.




Handcut dovetails - I have Japanese rip dozukis that work well for this, but I used a Bad Axe Stiletto dovetail saw for these.







Sapele is a hard wood with interlocking and twisting grain. My Japanese planes, which have a lower blade bed angle, work superbly for straight grain wood even very hard straight grain wood, but they don't work as well for this (Sapele) grain type. The higher bedding angle of the HNT Gordon planes works better here. I used an HNT Gordon Jack plane, scrapers, and sandpaper for these tables.

[rwsaunders]

Dave…those pieces are amazing!

[72gmc]

Wow.

(not qualified to say more)

[dcama5]

Dave…those pieces are amazing!

Thanks RW. Although not professionally, I have been doing this for quite a while. Last year our daughter requested a round table for their kitchen area and a side table for a wall near the entrance. We delivered these after Christmas last year.

Quarter sawn white oak:




A few years ago my wife asked for a large dining room table for events like Thanksgiving with family, so I built this. The chairs we bought used.

[dcama5]

Wow.

(not qualified to say more)

Dan,
Thanks, but if I can do it so can you. It does take research and practice though - especially dovetails. You also have to design for seasonal wood movement with differences in environmental moisture from winter to summer. After a lot of practice, here is an old dresser that didn't have dovetailed drawers. I built new dovetailed drawers a few months ago. I'm partial to through dovetails. I have viewed a number of the Ishitani videos - he is a master at both technique and design. Thanks for those.

[TonyP]

I hadn't seen this thread, but here are a couple end tables I just built for our daughter and her husband. They are both on faculty at the University of Houston and have a home there with two of our grandchildren. We will visit after Christmas and deliver these. They are made of Sapele which is an African mahogany.

Those are Japanese hand planes lined up on the shelf behind.




Handcut dovetails - I have Japanese rip dozukis that work well for this, but I used a Bad Axe Stiletto dovetail saw for these.







Sapele is a hard wood with interlocking and twisting grain. My Japanese planes, which have a lower blade bed angle, work superbly for straight grain wood even very hard straight grain wood, but they don't work as well for this (Sapele) grain type. The higher bedding angle of the HNT Gordon planes works better here. I used an HNT Gordon Jack plane, scrapers, and sandpaper for these tables.

[QUOTE=dcama5;1106294]Thanks RW. Although not professionally, I have been doing this for quite a while. Last year our daughter requested a round table for their kitchen area and a side table for a wall near the entrance. We delivered these after Christmas last year.



A few years ago my wife asked for a large dining room table for events like Thanksgiving with family, so I built this. The chairs we bought used.


[QUOTE=dcama5;1106295]Dan,
Thanks, but if I can do it so can you. It does take research and practice though - especially dovetails. You also have to design for seasonal wood movement with differences in environmental moisture from winter to summer. After a lot of practice, here is an old dresser that didn't have dovetailed drawers. I built new dovetailed drawers a few months ago. I'm partial to through dovetails. I have viewed a number of the Ishitani videos - he is a master at both technique and design. Thanks for those.



You do some nice work.

[dcama5]

You do some nice work.[/QUOTE]

Thanks Tony. I am definitely not the designer and craftsman shown in these Ishitani videos ( I also do not have all those power tools) but I have been doing this for a while and I appreciate the compliment.