by Elia Bizzarri | Jun 13, 2023 | Classes | 4 Comments
My wife Morgan and I got back from our honeymoon in Italy a couple weeks ago. We focused on eating and walking, but I did see a 15th century riven-oak square thing (wardrobe?) in a museum, so I know they did have respectable trees once upon a time. ...
by Elia Bizzarri | Jun 3, 2023 | Chairmaking Tools and Supplies, Chairs For Sale | 7 Comments
I've been rooting around in my shop's attic and I found this partially finished chair, abandoned by a student in one of my classes long ago. I can't remember what happened - maybe he got sick or something. I've been tripping over it long enough, so I'm selling it for...
by Elia Bizzarri | Apr 29, 2023 | Chair Stories | 13 Comments
I have just returned from a road trip to Michigan with my friend Bill Anderson. The trip had a dual focus: deliver 40 chairs and learn to make a barrel. This by far the largest chair order I've ever gotten. What fun! I'd take another job like this tomorrow -...
by Elia Bizzarri | Apr 3, 2023 | Craft Films | 4 Comments
One of my readers sent me this video. It's from 1964 Sweden, of an old fellow making a spinning wheel. The film is beautifully shot and silent, so you can can choose your own soundtrack. There's a lot of great parts, but my favorite is the boring and...
by Elia Bizzarri | Feb 20, 2023 | Built for Speed Book Project, Classes | 5 Comments
Last week I had four friends over for a trial run of a class set in the year 1803, building a copy of Samuel Wing's loop back chair. It was a great week. We all learned a lot, none more than me. Thanks to Damon O'Gan for the black-and-white photos below: We split,...
by Elia Bizzarri | Dec 29, 2022 | Classes | 0 Comments
For the first time in three years, I am teaching a chair class. Or really a chair-and-table class. I'm co-teaching with my friend Eric Cannizzaro for two weeks at Penland in the NC mountains. Come spend your days building chairs and your evenings watching the...
by Elia Bizzarri | Dec 20, 2022 | Chairs For Sale | 1 Comment
About eight years ago I taught a class at The Woodwright's School. That wasn't anything new - I've been teaching there twice a year for over a decade now. One of my students in that class built this chair - entirely with hand tools, of course. That's...
by Elia Bizzarri | Dec 11, 2022 | Antique Chairs, Finishing | 14 Comments
I got some photos back from my photographer of a reproduction chair I made for a collector in Kentucky, who owns the original of this chair. It is the only signed Windsor chair from KY known to exist, made near Lexington KY between about 1810 and 1830. The old chair...
by Elia Bizzarri | Oct 8, 2022 | Spoon Bits | 0 Comments
I got a bunch of questions about using spoon bits. Here's the answers to a few of them. How do you get the spoon bit to start where you want it? My favorite answer is to adjust your expectations. But there are some tips that will give you more...
by Elia Bizzarri | Sep 21, 2022 | Classes | 6 Comments
"I was talking with Dave Sawyer last week and I asked him if you could go work with him. He said 'yes.'" I was standing in Curtis Buchanan's garden, helping him pick vegetables. I had been apprenticing with Curtis for six years and he was worried that I was...
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