The day began with smoothing the parquetry compositions, first with toothing planes, both manufactured and home-made, then followed by blocks of pumice.
The next step was to lay out a simple banding knotwork design for one corner as an exercise.
Excavating for the inlay came next, followed by cutting and fitting the elements of the design.
In the end everyone went home with examples of the techniques to apply to their upcoming projects.
If this technique interests you I hope you will join me for next year’s class on October 1-3, 2026.
It’s been a banner year for the Barn Clan, with grandson #3 born in February and grandson #4 born last Friday, giving us quite the inventory. As the fates would have us all the grandsons live within five miles of each other, so Grandma Barn is always ready for a road trip.
Good thing Grandpa Barn has bins of tools ready for the new hands.
Opening up the panels glued up the night before is always a thrill for the students to see their work coming to fruition.
The next step is to trim the fields to make them good rectangles for the banding followed later by the borders. A variety of veneer saws were at work, ranging from pricey French saws to inexpensive Japanese ones. They all work.
The perimeter banding was applied and adhered with 192 gws glue, and the banding held in place with aluminum push pins that are surprisingly similar to those used by craftsmen 250 years ago.
Throughout the day and overnight, if a panel was not being worked it was placed in front of a box fan to drive off as much moisture as possible, to harden the glue under the parquetry. That strategy was somewhat successful.
Last month, for the first time in many years, I was able to offer an Introduction to Parquetry class at Joshua Farnsworth’s Wood and Shop near Charlottesville VA. We plan for me to offer the workshop again next year.
I had two exercises in mind for the students, all based on sawn veneer edge strips from boards.
The strips were then cut into identical 60-120-60-120 parallelogram “diamonds” or lozenges with a simple jig and a dovetail saw.
NB/ mea culpa – over the years I have attended and spoke at countless woodworking clubs and guilds, and invariably there is a show-n-tell session, and invariably they feature prominently some elaborate jig a member made to do this or that function. (Yes I know I used “invariably” twice in one sentence. That is a purposeful literary flourish.) In the old days I would just roll my eyes and tell myself, “That’s not woodworking.” Then we started the Roubo Transalation Project. Turns out the world of the ebeniste’ was all about jigs and patterns. To quote LBJ, “I reserve the right to be smarter than I used to be.”
Once the pile of lozenges got big enough, they laid out X and Y axes on a piece of paper to guide them then started assembling the composition by gluing down the lozenges to the paper with 135 gws hide glue.
Once the composition was large enough to cover the “field” of the substrate panel, in this case 1/2″ Baltic Birch plywood, the working face of the parquetry (ultimately the verso) was slathered with 192 gws hide glue, followed immediately by the face of the substrate panel.
Then the wo glued surfaces were brought together and clamped using another 1/2″ panel as the caul and a double layer of corrugated cardboard as a gasket.
A few months ago I posted about a large chunk of a maple tree that came down (about 18″ at the bottom), and my cutting it up.
After I was back home my son-in-law and Li’l T moved the bolts into an abandoned goatpen house I built 25 years ago. It is a better structure than some of the church-camp cabins I stayed in as a yoot. The wood will remain there until I decide what to do with it.
I expect it will mostly become turned bowls but my lathe needs a substantial upgrade for that to happen.
Recently my brother and his wife were visiting, and their routine included a long evening walk. One of the walks was in the aftermath of an early evening rain, with this being the result.
Polishing, polishing, polishing. Unfortunately we were so busy and occupied with our tasks I did not get many pictures. Maybe next year I can be more attentive to that task.
I’ve not been to the world headquarters of Lost Art Press since forever (at this point our interactions are via email) but found interesting the video tour James Wright and daughter created on their recent visit.
The exercises proceed apace, building finishes and the skll set to accomplish them.
I fully expect to reprise this workshop at Joshua’s next summer, along with perhaps a couple other offerings. Introduction to Parquetry is taking place the end of next week, so come on and join us.
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