My Small Apartment Workshop

This website represents a 3-year journey in my small apartment workshop where on weekends I use only hand tools to craft objects from wood. My attraction to woodworking is the opportunity to work with my hands by using antique hand-tools to skillfully shape wood. Through the use of hand tools, I embrace the physical demands of ripping, crosscutting, and re-sawing timber after the furniture parts have been carefully laid out. Dimensioning the rough sawn lumber until smooth with a hand plane as well as laying out and executing fine joinery until the pieces come to life and the final finishes applied. Since I studied Japanese art in college, my design and methods are strongly influenced by all things Japanese: I use both western and Japanese hand tools for creating my woodworks.

My goal in hand-tool woodworking is to internalize the shapes, forms, proportions and ratios that underlie a design—at first by learning from other artisan woodworkers, until I can unleash and embrace my inner artisan.