Finished Campaign Table

18th Century Campaign Style Folding Table

Top dyed antique cherry and sealed with polyurethane

Hi everyone. Here are some pictures of the 18th Century Campaign Table that I recently finished. It turned out quite well with the antique cherry stain, polyurethane coating on the top and the lexington green milk paint on the aprons and legs. I’ve learned a lot in making this project and hope to refine the leg profile design and the latching mechanism for securing the leg and apron assemblies. All in all, I am pleased that the design has the look of an 18th century piece, achieved the lightness sought by my client, and can be folded up easily for trips to reenactments.

Take care,
Jim

Side View of 18th Century Style Folding Table

Front view showing the apron design

Table is partially folded up to show the design.

Underside of the folding table showing the locking mechanism.

Filmed by Channel 2 WKTV

Hi. While at the Herkimer Homestead Day Celebration on October 4th, I was filmed using a spring pole lathe. My wife Barb was also there demonstrating scherenschnitte. Channel 2 WKTV, out of Utica, NY, happened to be at the celebration. You can see the Channel 2 feature by clicking on “Autumn celebrated 18th Century style at the Herkimer Home” at http://www.wktv.com/close2home/63483222.html.

I built the lathe several years ago and use it to demonstrate how Windsor chair legs could be turned using this primitive technology. It was fun to wear colonial garb and to teach children and adults about using a foot powered lathe. I’m wearing a red waistcoat (vest).

God Bless,
Jim

Handmade Campaign Style Table

18th Century Campaign Table

Hi. It has been a while since I’ve made a post. The summer came and went, and my wife and I were blessed with joyful moments. One exciting event was our son, Dan, getting married to Oksana in July. Their wedding was in Lviv, Ukraine, and truly awesome. We finally traveled out of the country.

Here is an 18th century campaign style table that I recently designed and built. I constructed it with cherry that was harvested in Upstate New York and utilized birch plywood for the top. I have always been fascinated with the 18th century campaign furniture style and a customed re-enactor asked me to make this for her. My wife has already put in her order and many people took a liking to it at Herkimer Home Historical Site where Barb and I did demonstrations on October 4th.

Here is some information on the project. I choose plywood for the top out a desire for stability, less weight, and ease of construction. With the exception of the plywood top which I dressed up with cherry edging, I sought to make the piece look 18th century as much as possible. I attached the cherry edging with hide glue and cut nails. I built the leg assemblies out of solid cherry and utilized mortise and tenon joinery. Tenons were then pegged. Keeping with the tradition of campaign furniture possessing portability yet remaining good looking, I added complimentary aprons with some decorative details on the long sides. To give the piece sufficient robustness, I attached the long aprons to the top with chiseled out screwing pockets. I utilized flathead screws in those pockets along with hide glue to fasten down the aprons. To anchor the ends of the long aprons, I utilized a combination of glue blocks and corner braces. Legs were turned on the lathe using cherry blanks that were 2 1/2″ square. After much searching, I choose this leg profile as being appropriate for an 18th century style campaign table.

Making the leg assemblies fold up was more effort than I had first realized. My design utilized a combination of 2″ barrel bolts at the points where the glue blocks are attached and 9/16″ diameter hardwood pins at the opposite leg ends. This was how I managed to lock the aprons. The table folds up nicely and yet has the stability that makes this an attractive and useful piece of furniture for 18th century re-enactors and homeowners.

I hope you enjoy the picture and please feel free to leave a comment if you also make British style campaign tables.

God bless,
Jim

New Website for J.D.Paulson Furnituremakers

Photo by Dan Paulson

Hi,
Barb and I have an even nicer website now at www.chairsbypaulson.com. Not only do we have some extra cool photos that were taken by our son Dan, but we have added Paypal.

As a small shop, Paypal offers us a way to help people make a deposit on a Windsor chair so they can get on our chair making schedule. We are hoping that this will make it easier for our customers to put a handmade Windsor chair in their home. It is easy to love these chairs once you see them up close, admire the craftsmanship, remember the history of our country in the late 1700s, and most of all when you sit in one of them and just feel the quality.

We are hooked on making Windsor chairs, one at a time, and we hope that our joy in making a fine chair can be a blessing for you.

Handmade Windsor Chairmaker’s Bowsaw

Handmade Windsor Chairmaker's Bowsaw

I have always enjoyed using hand tools and occasionally I’ll decide to try my hand at making my own tools. Here is my first Windsor chair maker’s bowsaw. My design reflects the work of J. Crate Larkin who was published in Fine Woodworking Magazine issue #151. However, I incorporated a number of modifications concerning saw size, handle and blade assembly aspects. This bowsaw project gave me an excuse to work with tiger maple, 3/8″ brass rod, copper end caps, and to salvage some maple scraps from turning Windsor chair legs. In contrast with Larkin’s saw, I scaled this design up for use in Windsor chair making work. My saw sports a 27 1/2 inch long blade which is narrow (3/8 inch wide). This is designed for cutting curves. Occasionally, Barb and I do demonstrations at the General Herkimer Home Historical site in Little Falls, NY, and this will be used to cut chair seats. Since this is my prototype, I’ll incorporate some refinements in any subsequent saws. Hopefully, I’ll offer some for sale in the near future for those who appreciate quality and beauty in a hand made woodworking tool. This saw works great in my hand and is a beautiful tool to hang on the wall until it is needed the next time.

bowsaw arm/handle detail

bowsaw arm angle view

Awesome Windsor Chair

Nantucket Fan Back

Hi friends,

When I am not being pastor for my congregation in Dolgeville,  I work on building Windsor chairs.  It is a labor of love and now a part-time business for my wife, Barb, and me.  Windsor chairmaking is a perfect fit for my woodworking and a woodcarving skills.   I am proud to be called a chairmaker, especially one that makes Windsor chairs!  Windsor chairmaking is a perfect fit for this person because I’ve always  loved to work with hand tools.  For me,  making a handmade American Windsor chair is the closest thing to making a handcrafted duck decoy.   I love duck decoys, especially the hand carved ones, but I love to make Windsor chairs more.  My dad got me started using hand tools as a kid, and like many woodworkers , I quickly learned that a sharp hand plane or spokeshave can offer far more control in the shaping of the wood.   Being good at using hand tools  also offers something else–tool marks as the telltale signs of quality–evidence of good ol’e fashion American craftsmanship.  To those who appreciate antiques from the 17th and 18th century, tool marks left behind by master chairmakers never go out of style when it comes to making reproductions.  Tool marks are evidence of an authentic Windsor chair reproduction.

So today, I want to show you a fine chair I just completed.  It is a Nantucket Fan Back chair and the most comfortable Windsor chair out there in my opinion.   It is a bigger chair and designed for a person to sit in it longer.  It has some awesome carving details that you can truly enjoy.  Being a woodcarving for over 27 years, I always look forward to carving the arms and crests on the Windsors.   This one I finished with a distressed black over red milk paint finish that I rubbed out carefully to mimic an aged surface.   I say distressed because I used the antique crackle product sold by the ™Old Fashioned Milk Paint Company and it leaves a distinctive antique appearing surface.  I hope you’ll enjoy looking at it.  I spent many hours rubbing it out, before sealing it with a gel polyurethane sealer.

I’ll be offering chairs like this Nantucket Fan Back on my website at www.chairsbypaulson.com.

Take care,
Rev. Jim aka “jim the chairmaker”

hand carved arm detail

carved knuckle detail

Pictures of Windsor chairs

I recently finished two Windsor chairs; a sack back and a Philadelphia high back chair.  I thought I’d give you some idea of how I finish a chair in the more traditional way.  So here are some pictures of chairs in progress.  I included a picture of the sack back after I applied a medium walnut wood dye.  That gives the wood an aged look which is nice in the areas where the milk paint might wear and reveal the bare wood.  You’ll see pictures of the sack back and the Philadelphia high back which have been finished with hand rubbed milk paint.  To further protect the milk paint finish on the chairs I also applied a wipe-on sealer.   The sackback chair features the lexington green milk paint color which gives it a classic look for Windsor chairs.  I also like the look of the black over red milk which is another classic finish applied to Windsor chairs.  I applied this antique looking finish on the Philadelphia high back.   It is quite attractive in giving you  highlights of the red milk paint showing through along various edges.  It might be hard to believe, but the beauty of these chairs with the hand rubbed milk paint really gets enhanced by people using them.   Once you look at these hand made chairs and sit in one, it is easy to want one of them in your home.   

Sack back ready for finishing

 

Sack back Windsor chair after applying a medium walnut wood dye

Sack back Windsor chair with lexington green milk paint finish

Philadelphia High Back Windsor with a black over red milk paint finish

Philadelphia High Back Windsor with a black over red milk paint finish

Carved Chairmaker’s Tool Chest by Rev. Jim Paulson – Fine Woodworking

Carved Chairmaker’s Tool Chest by Rev. Jim Paulson – Fine Woodworking

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beautiful wood and spirituality

a Windsor chair by the desk

Recently, I completed a Windsor sack back chair for a friend who wanted me to match the chair color to the walnut desk in their living room.   She,  along with her husband,  had earlier visited  my shop and asked me to make one for them.   So here are a couple pictures to share.   The finish on it features a walnut dye and several coats of polyurethane that was rubbed out to a satin sheen.   While I personally prefer the classic milk painted finish, I have to admit that this chair is awesome in its beauty.   Because she wanted it stained, I made the seat of basswood and it was truly enhanced by the walnut finish.  As a finishing touch, I also applied a label on the underside of the chair seat.  This was done on the original Windsor chairs and I gave it an antique look by sealing with garnet shellac.   Altogether, this walnut chair was a wise choice for my friend and a joy for me to complete.   

Sometimes woodworkers are asked if they sense a spiritual connection in their use of hand tools.  Call it curiosity or a fascination with famous people, not a few of us will wonder sometimes whether a star in the art of woodworking knows God.  Why is that?  For one, many famous professional woodworkers display great sensitivity to the nature of wood as a material, cherish a well tuned plane or saw,  and greatly enjoy the time spent in using sharp tools to cut through the wood fibers.  To appreciate things like the beauty of wood, to use and make fine tools can look like a person has a spiritual connection.   I have that same appreciation for making things of wood with one difference, I  give God all the credit for it being possible.   We can say it it is too personal of a thing to ask or reduce the conversation to be about defining spirituality.  As in what is spirituality for a woodworker?  To me it is simple.   If a person has a relationship with God then nothing we do can be without God’s presence.  Therefore, as a chairmaker, I celebrate that God stands beside me in my shop and in the making of every chair.  You can call that my spirituality or you can call it living in prayer.   I prefer the later.

Peace,

Jim

my label on the bottom of the chair seat

bottom of seat with label and brand

Sack Back Windsor chair with walnut finish

www.chairsbypaulson.com

Cozy by the Fire

Handmade Sack Back Windsor Chair

One of my joys in life is to make Windsor chairs using primarily hand tools and then to see those chairs proudly displayed in people’s homes.   Here is such a picture.   A chair by the fireplace in this home seems to invite someone to rest and warm themselves.   It is a great priviledge for me to be part of that experience.   As you can see,  this chair is at home with other accessories that celebrate the past.   Maybe you think of your home in the same way.   But let me say more about this chair that I made.   The Windsor chair featured in the picture was finished with black over red milk paint and then rubbed out to reveal the red milk paint as highlights.   It was then sealed with a couple hand rubbed coats of polyurethane to protect the finish.  The marks of shaping the wooden parts of the chair by the chair maker were neither removed nor hidden, but remain for the delight of the eyes.  “Everyone wanted to sit in the chair,” I was told by my customer.  What a great compliment to this preacher and chair maker!  I hope you enjoy this picture too. 

God bless all of you during this Holiday Season,   

Jim