Cirelloman, All,
I have been pondering the issue of identifying the factors that cause/enable a piece of furniture to last. I believe we have been barking up the wrong trees. We have talked about:
-Joints
-Glues
-Finishes
These all play a role, but there istwo more factors that completely overshadow these. I learned this over the years by going to estate auctions. I have been to a number of auctions that happened because the person who died was the last person in the family – had no known relatives. In almost all of these, the person was elderly and had stored furniture in attics, sheds, basements, etc which things piled on one another, and sometimes wet. When you get old, and are alone, keeping furniture forever is not on your mind very much!
SO, the first factor to work on if you want your furniture to last forever ( or let’s say 300 to 500 years, just for giggles), is
– YOU NEED TO HAVE LOTS OF HEIRS, AND YOUR HEIRS NEED TO HAVE HEIRS. So have lots of kids, and teach you kids that having kids is good. Make and post signs to this effect.
HOWEVER, having kids, by itself, is not a “guarantee” of the longevity of a piece of furniture. The second super important factor is:
– The Piece of Furniture MUST BE CONSIDERED AS SPECIAL by its current and future owners. One way to do this would be to buy authenticated rare pieces of furniture, such as the best pieces of the Goddards or the Townsends. Your children will fight over who gets it, and they will take good care of it — UNLESS THEY NEED MONEY, in which case they will sell it.
So just buying a famous old piece doesn’t work.
So What will insure the piece is special by the current owners and their progeny? MAKE IT SPECIAL TO THEM BY PUTTING HISTORY INTO IT. If they know it was made by Grandad, and it was signed using a woodburning pen by Grandpa, who dated it and put the place at which he made it, That is a BIG STEP forward.
Now seal the deal. Don’t just burn your name , date and place into it. Woodburn a paragraph on the bottom of it saying who it was for, and why, and add some nice facts.
Want to really seal the deal???? If it is a table, woodburn a family tree into the underside of the top. If you give it to your daugter, ask her to woodburn the names and dates of future kids on it, and to keep the tradition going.
Now you have a piece that could last forever. It will be considered “Special” by generations to come. It has Family History. it doesn’t have monetary value, so it can’t be sold to pay debts.
Now that you have had lots of kids, and they believe that they should keep the family going, and now that you have put history into the table (which might even include a drawer which keeps artifacts that current and future generations should put in the drawer — A FAMILY HISTORY DRAWER. —-
now it is time to think about how to make the table!!!! Now we can get back to real woodworking.
– Make the table out of two inch thick rock maple, or oak.
– Make all joints self-locking (draw bore pinned mortise and tenon), sliding dovetails, etc.
– Make sure you design for wood expansion and contraction.
– Use reconstitutable glue (hide glue, liquid hide glue, or white glue for edge joining boards
– use quarter rounds for edging the table – nothing fancy like ogees or anything with a sharp edge or small bead on the edge. KEEP IT SIMPLE, STUPID (KISS).
– Use a durable finish, such as oil based polyurathane
– Assume it will need some repairs or possibly refinishing in 150 to 200 years :-), and build it with the repairman in mind.
Now you have done everything possible to insure longevity of your table. You could go farther. On the bottom of the table, woodburn a prophecy: “Whosoever destroys this table, or lets it go outside this family will be put under a curse. They will have to live in South Texas or Chicago forever, or even worse – if that is possible”.
Except for the humor, I wrote this post in all seriousness. Those of us who make pieces of furniture for our family members want our stuff to last. The best way for that to happen is if it is considered SPECIAL by family members and future family members. Secondarily, it should be built strongly and simply using tough wood and strong joints, but with an eye to necessary repairs in a century or two.
Have fun.
Mel
Replies
Don't make Just Furniture
Mel,
Don't your last two points contradict eachother? Are oil-based polyurethanes not difficult to repair?
I think that you hit on a key point here - selling more than furniture. A good story can be enough to sell something, and in essence, the furniture becoumes a very functional souvenir of sorts.
"This table? Oh, yeah. Well, I was driving through Wallla Walla and needed a break, so I stopped in this little junk store. In the very back corner, covered in dust, I found this table. I paid $15 for it, drove it all the way home and refinished it. Quite the gem, sain't she?"
Chris.
"Don't your last two
Chris.
"Don't your last two points contradict each other? Are oil-based polyurethanes not difficult to repair?"
One can remove and replace a poly finish. By the time it needs to be done, Homer Formby will have something that can do it in three minutes and is lemon scented. :-)
Also, I suggested making the piece in hard maple or oak that is two inches thick. You could remove the finish with a belt sander, and refiniish it (except for the part underneath the top that is inscribed, but that doesn't need to be refinished anyway. Just wait for Homer. He'll have a "Poly refinisher" out shortly, and it will cost less than $100 a can.
My post was for making furniture that will last in your family. You are in the business. I believe that you could always work with the customer to develop a woodburned inscription that he will be happy with, and will add an extra "specialness" to the piece.
Have fun.
Mel
Lasting until when?
I've decided to make things that will last only until Dec 20, 2012 (the ending point of the Mayan calendar). Life is simpler now, but I find that I'm using more 2x4s and 16d nails. ;-)
Thanks Mel
But I think I'll just die when my time is up, and not worry about it.
You see I plan on being creamated, and my ashes put in the "history drawer" of the table.
No one could throw out the ashes of a family member. So the table will live on even
if I don't.
Cremanes
Why not have those ashes converted into one of those "new personal diamonds" and inlay it into the piece of furnature?
No need to clutter up the drawer with dust. ;-)
"Family History Finish" by Bob FLexner
GRW,
Please don't tell anyone, because the word is not out yet, BUT Bob Flexner is coming out with a new "Family History Finish", which will let you really add a personal touch to a piece of furniture after you are gone. So you will need the help of a friend or family member. You take your ashes and mix them with the finish. It acts like a glaze, with the ashes going mostly to the low spots and in the corners to add a beauty that usually only comes with age.
With Flexner's new "Family History" finish, you can not only make a piece of furniture, but you can become part of it. "Grandpa" will be right there in the chair with you." so to speak.
You just have to have your helper mix the correct amount of ash with the finish, and put it on according to directions. Unfortunately this finish cannot be sprayed, as it tends to clog the sprayer nozzle.
The ashes from a single body can be used to finish hundreds of pieces.
I believe this will not only revolutionize the field of finishing, but will cause furniture to be better cared for and to last longer. After all, who wants to hurt Grandpa.
Have fun.
Mel
Same thing with a new name
Mel,
That's not new. We did that with my Aunt Poly.. She came out so good they named a finish after her.. : )
Not just heirs.
It's not the number of heirs, but whether they are rich. These Goddarnd and Townsend, and the Studio pieces that are the modern equivalent, were originally bought by rich folks, and it takes rich folks to keep them spruced up and out of damp cellars or leaky barns. .
By the way, oil based polyurethanes just don't have a strong record for longevity, however protective they might be in the short term. Past 20 or 30 years you may see deterioration. Shellac, on the other hand, can point to examples of 200 year life in use.
I absolutely agree that the piece MUST be deemed to be special.
Steve,
Thanks for the input. My belief is that any finish would have to be redone every once in a while. Re-doing a poly finish every fifty years isn't so bad. Surely there will be good poly strippers in a few years that will ease the job.
I agree with you on the beauty and easy of repair of shellac, but I raised three kids and now have four grandkids, and shellac on the kitchen table just ain't the way I would go. Poly, IMHO, is the only approach for a kitchen table that is meant to last. My brother made my kitchen table back in 1970. It is thick pine. After raising three kids, the table was pretty beat up. I stripped it and smoothed the visible surfaces, and finished it with poly. about seven years ago. It gets the dings thatt one expects in pine and looks great.
My daughter has the late Victorian oak table that I finished in Poly about seven years ago. She not only has her family, but she is the official family party hostess, so the table gets lots of use. I have detected no visible deterioration in seven years.
If the rebuilt antiques took work to keep up, my daughter wouldn't be as happy with them. I feel there is a place for shellac, and a place for poly. Both have valid applicability. I re-do old clocks, for example. Shellac is the way to go. One of the guys in the Washington Woodworkers Guild was a big fan of shellac. A few years he made a kithen table and finished it with shellac. A few months ago, he announced that this experiment had not gone well, and that he definitely would not recommend it for a kitchen table, and would not do it again. He switched to poly for thatt application.
It is the customer that we have to keep satisfied, even when the customer is ourself.
Have fun.
Mel
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