Chairmaking Books

In Search of the Appalachian Ladderback Chairmaker By Andrew D. Glenn For more than 200 years, chairmakers in Appalachia built ladderbacks to sell to neighbors and the occasional tourist. It was a tradition that was handed down through generations. But with the rise of furniture factories and mechanisation, woodworker Andy D. Glenn wondered if there were any traditional chairmakers left. So...

By Christopher Schwarz From the outside, it seems like you need to harvest special wood from the forest, buy a bunch of exotic tools, master a lot of crazy angles, and learn high-tolerance joinery to make a chair that is comfortable, strong and approaches sculpture. The truth is that everyday woodworkers – farmers, amateurs and people in other trades – made wonderful chairs using...

The Stick Chair Journal is an annual publication that expands the universe of all things stick chair. More history. More plans. More techniques. Plus reviews of tools. The Journal is a supplement to the content of "The Stick Chair Book" (which is free to download or can be bought as a book here). Each issue of the Journal contains a complete plan for a stick chair. The Stick Chair...

By Jennie Alexander In 2014, Jennie Alexander somewhat reluctantly agreed to a third edition of her 1978 seminal book on green woodworking, “Make a Chair From a Tree” – a book that launched the careers of thousands of woodworkers and helped ignite a green woodworking movement in this country. Her reluctance wasn’t due to a lack of passion for the book’s subject –...

by Christopher Williams “Good Work: The Chairmaking Life of John Brown” by Christopher Williams is the first biography of one of the most influential chairmakers and writers of the 20th century: Welshman John Brown. The book’s title of “Good Work” was an expression John Brown used to describe a noble act or thing. He once mused he wanted to create a “Good Work”...

By John Brown Welsh Stick Chairs is a small but mighty book. At 104 pages long, this book can be read in an afternoon, but it has changed the lives of thousands of woodworkers all over the globe. John Brown (1933-2008) was a chairmaker in Wales who specialized in Welsh stick chairs, a vernacular form of furniture that was typically made by the end users. Compared to Windsor chairs, Welsh stick...