What a sharp plane blade changes in the wood
A honed plane iron can sever fibres cleanly, but grain direction, shaving depth and chip control determine whether the new surface stays smooth.
Independent thought. In print.
One-Car Garage
A modest workshop, furniture that gets used and projects with room for mistakes.
Words by Caleb Finch
The archive
4 storiesThe latest edition
Why a tabletop needs room to move
A solid wood top changes width as humidity changes. Buttons, slots and movable fasteners hold it to the base while leaving room across the grain.
The best workshop upgrade was an empty square metre
There was nowhere to stand in my workshop. I had a bench, tools, three promising projects and enough offcuts to suggest I was preserving a forest by installments. To reach one useful object, I moved
Making a shelf for the things we actually own
The shelf began with a photograph of a beautiful shelf. This was my first mistake. The photograph contained three tasteful objects. Our household contains cookbooks of several heights, a plant with ambitions and a ceramic
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