This new paperback expands on the techniques covered in Shaping Wood. It covers joinery relating to 18th-century furniture styles, as well as the demanding techniques required to complete ornate period pieces. Turning and carving, as well as building accurately, are all included in a highly visual format. Over 400 photos and drawings illustrate the methods -- from half-blind dovetails to gooseneck moldings. If you love period details and long to create them, you will want this book.

You'll learn about:

• Casework techniques
• Moldings and edge treatments
• Carved and turned legs
• Period chair components
• Finials and applied carvings

About the author
Lonnie Bird is a professional woodworker, teacher, writer, and tool designer whose work has been featured in Fine Woodworking. His books include Shaping Wood, The Shaper Book, and The Bandsaw Book. He lives in Dandridge, Tennessee.

Introduction

SECTION 1. Moldings
Ogees
Coves
Beads
Crown Moldings
Dentil Moldings

SECTION 2. Legs
Tapers
Knee Blocks
Cabriole Leg

SECTION 3. Tabletops
Scalloped Top
Dished Top
Rule Joints

SECTION 4. Feet
Pad Foot
Trifid Foot
Ball and Claw Foot
Flat Base
Ogee Feet

SECTION 5. Bedposts
Bedposts

SECTION 6. Chairs
Splats
Arm and Post
Chair Legs
Chair Shoe
Side Rail

SECTION 7. Casework
Dovetails
Template Shaped Components
Gooseneck Molding
Arched Molding
Rosettes
Finials
Doors
Flutes and Reeds
Base and Capital Molding
Candle-Slide

Index

Furniture from 18th-century America continues to be among the most popular styles of all time. While other forms of furniture come into style and soon appear dated, period furniture continues as a best-selling classic.

And for good reason -- period furniture is rich with detail. It was produced during a time when there was a broad separation between classes of people. Those with means, just as with people today, sought ways to display their wealth and status in society. One of the primary ways to display opulence in the eighteenth century was through finely crafted furniture. In large, wealthy cities, such as Philadelphia, Boston, and Newport, Rhode Island, furnituremakers crafted highly developed furniture artforms. Embellishment became the norm as artisans pierced, carved, sculpted, inlaid, and gilded what is recognized today as some of the finest examples of furniture ever produced.

As a furnituremaker for over twenty years, I enjoy the challenge of reproducing American period furniture both for its level of technical difficulty as well as its timeless beauty. As you study, draw, and reproduce these classic examples of Americana, you can't help but to be immensely impressed with the period craftsman's sense of design and proportion, as well as his tremendous skill with a few relatively simple tools.

As a woodworker, if you're not accustomed to using hand tools, then I encourage you to begin by accumulating the essential edge tools such as planes, chisels, and a dovetail saw and enjoying learning to use them. Furniture produced entirely with machines is void of the fine details that define period furniture. Quite simply, machines for all their sophistication can't duplicate what's created by a trained eye and a skillful hand. In other words, while it is acceptable and desirable to use machines to saw curves, shape moldings, and even cut some types of joints, hand tools are still required for many of the details. In the process you'll experience the delight of cutting a dovetail by hand and hearing the unique sound of a sharp plane as it slices the surface of a board.

No book or even several volumes of books can contain the wealth of furniture details created by America's colonial craftsmen. But, it is my hope that this book will inspire you to deeper study and appreciation of period furniture, and, most importantly, to develop your skill in building it.

Customer Reviews from Amazon

This is pretty comprehensive for someone interested in or embarking on a period project. the descriptions and pictures are clear and detailed, although most will be familiar with the subjects and possibly have their own method of working, it's good to have a view on how someone else tackles the problems that can be encountered.
The Author needs no introduction to woodworkers, (especially in the USA) and has complied this book carefully, a lot of effort has gone into the illustration, a good buy, worth the money.

This book was exactly what I was looking for. It is very concise and shows multiple ways of making several of the details. I would recommend this book.

I am surprised at the low book review. This is one of the best teaching books I have read. Lonnie Bird is an artist at conveying woodworking concepts. This is not a step by step how to guide to a completed project. Every detail that is covered is very well covered. I have both of the Lonnie Bird books and believe they complement each other. I highly reccomend this book and this author! If you want a good step by step book on Period Furniture try: Glen Huey's "Building Period Furniture" Both of these books are excellent. See my review under this book on Amazon.I have bought many books that are barely worth taking home. These two books are worth more than they cost! The printing and pictures in This book are superior as are all others I have read by Taunton press.

This is a valuable aid in making details. Another reviewer states that 80% of the book is in another book by Bird. This might be a bit of an over statement - no matter if just 20% is new material the book is worth it. I own both of the books he addresses - I noticed the duplication right away. The real question is "will this book make you a better period furniture maker?" I am 57 years old - own every tool required to make period furiture - hold a Masters certification from Marc Adams School of Woodworking - have taken course work with some of the top people in the field - I am now working on a Philidelphia Low Boy and am wooking with Allan Breed (instructor) - and this book is helpful and even insightful. I know at least four of the eighteen of us in class have purchased this book.

If you already own Lonnie Bird's Complete Illustrated Guide to Shaping Wood you will be extremely disappointed with this book. It seemed that 80% was duplicate material. The book descriptions says that this book expands on the techniques covered in Shaping Wood. To me, it looked like nothing more than a page for page copy.

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