Most woodworkers like the relative permanence of their hobby. It’s nice to know that the things you’ve built are going to stick around for a while. Long enough, in some cases, to be passed down from generation to generation of your family. To become, in other words, an heirloom. We’ve compiled in this special issue a group of projects meant to help you increase the odds that the things you build will achieve that status.
We’ve selected these projects from a variety of classic styles with endurance — the “staying power” that means people today find a Chippendale mirror just as attractive as the inhabitants of the previous two centuries. In addition to the solid, linear styling of Arts and Crafts pieces, we’ve also tapped iinto the best of a variety of other styles from woodworking’s history.
You’ll find a project with the Art Deco stylings of famed designer Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann, and you’ll be able to fill your living room with the latest rage of Victorian times if you build a bookcase inspired by Charles Eastlake. An Arts and Crafts picture frame is itself worthy to be called a work of art, and Prairie school master Frank Lloyd Wright would be proud to sit in the chair that bears his name.
Here’s a preview of what you’ll find in this special issue:
Frank Lloyd Wright Chair
Eastlake-Inspired Bookcase
Arts and Crafts Picture Frame
Mackintosh Chair
Shaker Sewing Cabinet
Chippendale Mirror
Ruhlmann Bookcase
You’ll also read WJ editor Larry Stoiaken’s homage to Mike McGlynn, one of our regular craftsmen who regularly produces heirloom quality work -- just like you will with the projects in this issue.