Chair Club Part 2 - building up the surface

It took a while to position and set the various woods on the top surface of my chair, but once this was complete, I took my stool top to the band saw and trimmed it square.
 
The woods I have the privilege of including in making my chair are a combination of cheap and durable, and expensive and durable. Every piece has been salvaged locally, or donated kindly to the cause by our teacher Richard.

Woods:

Iroko (Milicia excelsa) - origins in Tropical Africa, a medium wood that darkens over time. Very durable and resistant to termite attack which is always welcome.

Panga Panga (Millettia stuhlmannii) - a rich African wood, very dark brown with black streak. I think it looks like beautiful dark hair when polished up! Another termite avoider. 
 
  - on target for a super durable multi-wood stool!

The other main wood I have used for the surface is multi-layer plywood, a particularly fashionable material in contemporary design (you may have noticed). This was salvaged by Kira and I, although would have been v.cheap had we bought it. It is multi plies of birch veneer which results in a wood that is tough, and I think, very interesting to look at. 


- some designers do great things with this plywood > 




 



Meanwhile, Kira's miniature chair was being painstakingly cut. Each leg angle was cleverly chosen, kindred to a retro Scandinavian dining chair.

Chair Club part 1

There are some key rules in Chair Club. The first rule is that Chair Club is not open to new members - we are sorry for this but hopefully this Chair Club will inspire another chair club!

We have met and made chairs on Tuesday evenings for the past 4/5 months, often followed by a Street Food Chef burrito. Chair making is hungry work.

The second rule is Chair Club is not exclusive to chair making. Now that we have reached the penultimate session - my "milking stool" (four legged so it doesn't technically qualify) is almost ready for an oil finish - we are speculating about season two of Chair Club, and it might involve metal, and creating non-functional things.

Here's a short diary of Chair Club, in pictures; myself, Kira Askaroff and the brilliant Richard Bartle, chieftain of Chair Club.

Part 1 

Preliminary sketches done, I decided to make a short stool for my bedroom dresser, akin to a milking stool but four legged.

Kira opted to create a miniature chair, inspired by a series of miniature furniture that Richard made for a previous project Deities at the Bottom of the Garden (a series of twelve exquisitely and accurately rendered scale models of a typical garden shed, each containing the interior of a different temple or church).

We selected our materials - mine combines various woods on the surface which will be sanded flat, and the leg joints will be visible on top too. 

Woods; Rose wood, panga panga, multi layer plywood

Glueing the various pieces of timber down.

Lino Print Christmas Cards: Partridge in a Pear Tree

Back to the lino board this year! Time to make Christmas cards.

A Partridge in a Pear Tree

Carving

extracts

first set - lino block printing ink

second set

I decided to produce a more detailed lino design than my robin of a previous Christmas. The result is good, though it has been a little tricky to print consistently, as the areas I have carved are variable in depth and smoothness - this matters as much as the neatness of your relief areas.

Also I first used lino specific printing block paint (water based) and the results weren't as smart or sharp as the plum emulsion paint tester pot* that I tried afterwards!  

 * Note: It is not as easy to clean the lino itself after using non-block printing paint.

As usual, here's a look over the Christmas cards I have hand painted / printed in recent years:

2012 - Potato Printed Robin

2011 - Watercolour squirrels, robins scene

2010 - Lino cut Robin prints

2009 - Repeat watercolour Christmas pattern for cards, advent calendar and tags

2008 - Re-interpreted Victorian Christmas Cards - Handpainted