The unedited John Brown

UKworkshop.co.uk

Help Support UKworkshop.co.uk:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
:lol:
It certainly does speed up production. I turned a lot of knobs and shaker pegs once. The first dozen or so every one was different and to get 2 the same would be quite painstaking. After a bit they roll off the lathe every one perfect and as you get into the swing of it you don't want to stop!
 
I think the reason that a lot of craft furniture makers don't batch, but do custom one-offs is that for many things (i.e. not trad chairs which are particularly suited to small scale batch production) we fall between two stools. We end up making things that, even being batched, are still a lot more expensive than similar things made in a full-on factory in China, without them being obviously special enough to make it worth people paying the extra. So you are making a considerable financial outlay to make the things, but with a very high risk that they will not sell. And because they are much bulkier than, say, a potters pots, or a stack of cloth, you then have a real problem of where to store them in the meantime. And where do you sell them — shop space is expensive, and online is tricky as people are so adept at bargain hunting online now....

Not saying it's impossible, and it is easier to batch some things than others (trad style dining tables can work if you have somewhere to store them I think) but it's still an iffy proposition, particularly with large items. And with smaller items it can be even harder to show people where the value is in the price you have to charge compared to foreign factory-made things. Particularly when you realise that probably the vast majority of people are really not interested in quality, they are interested in something that does what they need, looks OKish, and is affordable, and that's about it.

So then maybe one can go to the top end of the market, and batch things with a real wow factor, but at this level even when batched the cost is pretty exorbitant. But if you also sell a personal service, where the client has some design input, and a relationship with the maker, and they are are getting something unique to them for all that money, the high price tends to make a bit more sense. So one tends to make custom one-offs. It's a fairly pragmatic way to go in the end, I don't think it has that much to do with not being willing to contemplate batch work in principle.
 
Jacob":oqcs8oos said:
I don't know why woodworkers have got hung up on the "one off" idea.

I don't know either. To return to the start of this thread, John Brown hated doing batches. I love it because you get faster and faster, and devise new techniques. I suspect he didn't like commissions, and preferred to make something as well as he could and see if anyone would buy it. Perhaps he needed that clear approval, rather than the slightly woolier relationship between maker and client when the piece is commissioned. I can understand that.
 
We're doing a piece in Living Woods this month about the making of 'Van Gogh' chairs in Spain in the 1960s. Reportedly the makers could produce them in 15 minutes each, from the cleft log. Amazing photos. All done by hand, with one man producing components and the other assembling the chairs.
 
Michaelangelo schmangelo, why on earth is that overrated old darling always qouted high on the cognosceinti top 10 lists as the epitome of culture??

I think for two reasons. Firstly because, whatever one thinks of the social setup at the time, he was in fact astonishingly good at making art. Secondly because of his role in the renaissance, which was after all a key part of the movement in Western culture away from superstition and religious dogmatism, and towards rationality, and questioning, and science — and which therefore played a fundamental role in bringing about the world we have to day. One can argue about whether or not that is a good thing, but it is a thing, and a significant one. Not bad for the cultural output of a few warring and fragmented city states.

Its the same old chestnut, the dogmatic assumption that european culture (art, theatre, opera, whatever) is a simply marvellous pheomenon and is the benchmark of high brow quality, regardless of how it was created in practical terms, and what it cost.

It's possible to appreciate the good in Western art, and the positive contribution is has made, and its many accomplishments, without being blind to its very significant problems and contradictions, and the damage it has been a part of. Appreciating it does not automatically mean that you swallow it whole, or that you look down on the art of other cultures or feel superior to them.

I think that probably the majority of people are not making the dogmatic assumption you assume they are, just because they say they enjoy Michelangelo's work. Most people are a bit more thoughtful than that.
 
Nick Gibbs":xtnt057n said:
We're doing a piece in Living Woods this month about the making of 'Van Gogh' chairs in Spain in the 1960s. Reportedly the makers could produce them in 15 minutes each, from the cleft log. Amazing photos. All done by hand, with one man producing components and the other assembling the chairs.
Sounds interesting. I might buy the mag. It's years since I last bought one - actually it was bought for me and had that inflatable woman made of plywood on the cover!

15 minutes? Woodworkers today - it'd take them longer than that to flatten their japanese waterstones. :roll:
 
Jacob":2ctkzjwb said:
15 minutes? Woodworkers today - it'd take them longer than that to flatten their japanese waterstones. :roll:

Hmm, 15 minutes, not enough time to flatten the concrete slab I use to flatten my waterstones :?
 
We're doing a piece in Living Woods this month about the making of 'Van Gogh' chairs in Spain in the 1960s. Reportedly the makers could produce them in 15 minutes each, from the cleft log. Amazing photos. All done by hand, with one man producing components and the other assembling the chairs.

I wonder how comfortable the chairs were. And whether the makers would have lived that life if they had the choice of another. Still it's good going!

Apparently in the old days of boatbuilding a team of a man and a boy had to turn out a clinker dinghy every two weeks for the yard to make money. 25 a year!! That's insanely fast. But in order to do that there has to be a whole infrastructure, and culture, and market behind it which is not there anymore. It's not so much about the skill of the man and the boy as it is about the social set-up and environment and circumstances which makes that skill possible to develop and maintain. It's a technology really, and it seems mind-blowing to us in the same way as the things 3d CNC can do would seem mind blowing to them. And of course they would struggle with the CNC every bit as much as we would struggle with the boatbuilding....
 
marcus":2pq0139s said:
I wonder... whether the makers would have lived that life if they had the choice of another.

Who knows. The agony of choice! I remember hearing an entrepreneur on Desert Island Discs or something explaining how they felt about their success. He or she said something along the lines: "Well I'm at the place now that I always wanted to be when I was at the stage, starting up and struggling, that I now realise I was happiest and wish I could be again!"

No idea which issue of LW had the inflatable plywood woman on the front!
 
marcus":32x5oxpf said:
..... And whether the makers would have lived that life if they had the choice of another. ........
Ted Frost in "From Tree to Sea" waxes lyrical about the good old hard working days.
OK so life could be grim (it still can) but on the other hand if your had your health, good relationships with your family, fellow workers and the community, enough to eat and drink and somewhere comfortable to sleep etc. Perhaps add "youth" to the equation.
 
Jacob":1qmuas1t said:
Perhaps add "youth" to the equation.

Except perhaps older people were treated with a bit more care in the past and in different cultures. Or perhaps not.
 
Ted Frost in "From Tree to Sea" waxes lyrical about the good old hard working days. OK so life could be grim (it still can) but on the other hand if your had your health, good relationships with your family, fellow workers and the community, enough to eat and drink and somewhere comfortable to sleep etc. Perhaps add "youth" to the equation.

I don't doubt it! I'm sure there were times and places where the traditional life was wonderful to be a part of, when certain factors all came together all in one place. It probably partly depended, as well, on the sort of person you were; we are all so different from each other, and some will thrive where others struggle and vice versa. But it could also be horrendous for everyone if the necessary factors shifted just a little.

I know for sure that I would have gone nuts if I had been expected to spend my whole life turning identical chair parts or working a saw pit. I would probably have run away to sea and ended up in all sorts of bother as a result. Prospecting for gold on the Spanish Main maybe. Romantic thought. More likely to have been press ganged into the navy and hit by a cannonball....

But personally I'm convinced that the past is the past, and we can't go back there; you can't put the genie back in the bottle once it is is out. So we have to go on — hopefully gathering up some of the best of that past and taking it with us as we go....
 
marcus":3fr8az42 said:
It's possible to appreciate the good in Western art, and the positive contribution is has made, and its many accomplishments, without being blind to its very significant problems and contradictions, and the damage it has been a part of. Appreciating it does not automatically mean that you swallow it whole, or that you look down on the art of other cultures or feel superior to them.

I think that probably the majority of people are not making the dogmatic assumption you assume they are, just because they say they enjoy Michelangelo's work. Most people are a bit more thoughtful than that.

Just to expand that, it's possible to enjoy the beautiful buildings in Bristol without being in favour of a return to slavery.

BugBear
 
bugbear":1ilzct0a said:
Just to expand that, it's possible to enjoy the beautiful buildings in Bristol without being in favour of a return to slavery.

BugBear

Agreed. The same goes for the huge personal fortunes built on making and selling tobacco products, but without the philanthropy of the Wills family, Bristol would not have got its university when it did, nor would it have such good buildings. I suggest that the intelligent approach is to acknowledge the history, be open about the origins but keep and use the facilities.

We do still have personal wealth being highly concentrated in the hands of a few. And some of those wealthy people do make themselves a second career of giving their money away to do good.
 
Jacob":33lbi4px said:
Nick Gibbs":33lbi4px said:
We're doing a piece in Living Woods this month about the making of 'Van Gogh' chairs in Spain in the 1960s. Reportedly the makers could produce them in 15 minutes each, from the cleft log. Amazing photos. All done by hand, with one man producing components and the other assembling the chairs.
Sounds interesting. I might buy the mag. It's years since I last bought one - actually it was bought for me and had that inflatable woman made of plywood on the cover!

15 minutes? Woodworkers today - it'd take them longer than that to flatten their japanese waterstones. :roll:
Talking of repeats - this mornings paper reminded me that Van Gogh did lots of repeats of some of his best known works.
Matisse did too. So did Stradivarius. And many other artists/craftsmen - repeating one by one, or in batches, or in print or casting runs.
 
Back
Top