My First Design

Gary Rogowski, a master woodworker and furniture designer (and longtime Craftsmanship collaborator) reflects on how his first handmade bench came into being.

images courtesy of Gary Rogowski

Dear Friends,

Sometimes a creative life begins not with a grand plan, but with a scrap or two of raw material and a moment of curiosity. In today’s featured article, master craftsman and woodworking instructor Gary Rogowski recalls how finding a discarded slab of Douglas fir and an old hand plane became the starting point for a lifelong practice.

Rogowski’s first attempt at a handhewn bench may not be part of his extensive professional portfolio today, but it endures as a humble monument to the innate human impulse to “make something.”

We hope you’ll enjoy reading “My First Design,” by Gary Rogowski.

We always welcome your thoughts and suggestions, which you can offer in a comment, by tagging us in Substack Notes, or via email. 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

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My First Design

by Gary Rogowski

My first attempt to design a seating piece came about from a piece of wood I found. I discovered this slab, along with an old wooden hand plane, around the side of a house where I stayed. A half-round chunk of Douglas fir had split off from a log.

At the time I had no idea what the wood could be used for or what the plane did, but it seemed wise to keep them both as I considered my future. Maybe they would prove useful.

Two years later, I decided to teach myself how to build furniture. Chairs and benches seemed to be useful items, so I attempted to make a bench with that slab I’d found. I thought its shape perfect. To make the base I took some two-by-fours and glued them into two columns. This, my first seating piece, I still keep as a reminder. Its shape charms only its maker, I fear.