Author name: Enthusiast

In the late ’80s and early ’90s you could visit a strip club and it wouldn’t be sleazy. The reason: Mike Tyson. He would simply walk through opponents with devastating power in the first few rounds. Nobody wanted to order the expensive pay-per-view at home with the odds of it being over in seconds. So the strip clubs could collect a door fee, a two-drink minimum and be done with […]

The post Don’t Fight the Work – Body Mechanics in the Shop appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.

It won’t come as much of a surprise that woodworkers are frequently good at more than one thing. Sometimes it’s necessary, other times it’s just for fun. I was in Hillsborough, N.C., last week working with Elia Bizzarri on two new videos and we started talking about what music to use. He asked if we’d like him and a few of his friends to play something. “Yes!” was the easy […]

The post Elia Bizzarri: Multi-talented Woodworker appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.

On my first visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met) in New York I saw, among the monumental and famous pieces, a small item that captured my eye. It was so impressive that I even decided to buy a postcard with a picture of it. This was a spherical shaped miniature wooden box that, once opened, displayed an intricate biblical scene that shocked me with its complexity and level […]

The post Dutch Boxwood Bead Boxes appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.

After the worst Thursday on record, I awoke the next morning and resolved to sort out this stool. I needed more maple, so I headed to Frank Paxton Hardwoods and found the perfect board waiting for me. Straight. Clear. Flat. Reasonably priced. So I assumed I’d get into a car accident on the way home. (No collisions.) I milled the new seat, assuming it would be case hardened and twist […]

The post Call it Done (For Now) appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.

Rubbing out a finish to achieve a perfectly flat surface on porous woods such as mahogany and walnut is a lot of work, so it’s usually reserved for tabletops. Using a film-building finish (not oil), the first step is to sand the finish back, or level it, to leave the pores filled in. You usually have to do this even if you have used a pore filler because there’s always […]

The post Rubbing Out a Finish: The Plastic Spreader Trick appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.

I don’t always post holiday-themed projects, but hey – with my heritage, I can’t pass up the opportunity to share some Celtic knotwork in celebration the Emerald isle. So here are a couple woodworking articles from our archives that feature Celtic carving (though the “Peasant Chair” has a distinctly Moravian flavor to all but the carved back). Both the “Celtic Love Spoon” and the “Peasant Chair” predate our digital files, […]

The post A Couple of Celtic-influenced Projects appeared first on Popular Woodworking Magazine.