Master of the Chair—and the Tools
Master of the Chair—and the Tools
A lifetime of tinkering has led furniture designer Brian Boggs to create a line of innovative woodworking tools, along with some of the world’s finest chairs.
Dear Friends,
Perhaps no story we’ve published illuminates the artisan’s relationship with their tools as much as this week’s feature. Its subject, Brian Boggs, made a name for himself by crafting some of the world’s finest wood chairs—including his Sculpted Fanback armchair, winner of a prestigious Good Designs Award. But heirloom furniture is just one side of his innovative mindset. Rarely content with off-the-shelf solutions, Boggs designs, modifies, and constantly tinkers with new versions of his tools until they meet his exacting standards. Even the classic mortise-and-tenon system for wooden joints wasn't good enough, so he refined it even further. From spokeshaves to shave horses, every tool in Boggs’ workshop is an extension of his creative process.
I hope you’ll enjoy reading: “Brian Boggs, Master of the Chair,” written by Janine Latus and photographed by Michael Oppenheim. And don’t miss the short video, above, of Boggs demonstrating his custom wood rail-bender, an invention that enables him to do a job that would normally require two or three people.
Coming next week, we’ll have a new Field Notes story for you about a Nashville-based sewist and designer who’s reimagining Western-style clothing—and dressing many of country music’s rising stars. After that, “The Secrets of Mastery” returns with a wonderful new episode that wraps up our theme for the month: the role that tools play in a master’s work.
We hope you’ll consider upgrading to a paid subscription, if you haven’t done so already. Either way, you’ll find a rich archive of in-depth reported features, audio stories and interviews, photo essays, Field Notes, and documentary shorts—along with resources like our Artisans’ Directory, our guide to U.S.-based craft & folk schools, and more on our website—all free of ads, and free of charge.
We welcome your thoughts and suggestions—which you can offer in a comment, by tagging us in Substack Notes, or via email. You can also find us on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. Thank you for reading and sharing our stories, for supporting our work with a paid subscription if you can, and for being such a loyal part of the Craftsmanship community.
Sincerely,
Todd Oppenheimer
Publisher & Editor-in-Chief, Craftsmanship Magazine
“The Secrets of Mastery” is a series of brief, intimate conversations with artisans, innovators, and other pioneers about what it takes to master their craft, and why handmade matters. It’s available only to our paid subscribers here on Substack. For just $6/month or $60/year, you’ll get access to the entire series, including previous episodes, along with other premium features we have in the works.
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