19 – Final Notes

  1. A Walnut Windsor Chair – Introduction
  2. The Log
  3. Transport
  4. Rough Lumber
  5. Seat Blanks
  6. Legs
  7. Arm Posts and Tapered Holes
  8. Carve the Seat
  9. Turn the Undercarriage
  10. Assembling the Seat and Undercarriage
  11. Spindles
  12. Arms
  13. Assembling the Spindles and Arms
  14. Crest Version 1 — The Form Bent Laminated Crest
  15. Crest Version 2 — The Steam Bent Crest
  16. Final Assembly
  17. Detailing
  18. Finishing a Walnut Windsor Chair
  19. Final Notes

Entry 19

Final Notes  –   7/22/2008

Photos of the completed walnut and hickory chair, below.

Some final thoughts on this process and notes on sources for information on Windsor chairs.

There are a number of sources that I use for information on Windsor chairs.  Some of them are:

Dunbar, M. (1984).  Make a Windsor Chair with Michael Dunbar.  Newtown, CT: The Taunton Press.  (ISBN 0-918804-21-3)

Evans, N. G.  (1996).  American Windsor Chairs.  New York: Hudson Hills Press.  (ISBN 1-55595-112-0)

Evans, N. G.  (1997).  American Windsor Furniture.  New York: Hudson Hills Press.  (ISBN 1-55595-064-7)

Evans, N. G. (2006).  Windsor-Chair Making in America.  Hanover, NH: University of New England Press.  (ISBN 1-58465-493-7)

Kassay, J.  (1998).  The Book of American Windsor Furniture.  Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press.  (ISBN 1-55849-137-6)

Moser, T.  (1982).  Windsor Chairmaking.  New York: Sterling Publishing.  (ISBN 0-8069-7630-6)

Santore, C.  (1981).  The Windsor Style in America.  Philadelphia, PA: Running Press.  (ISBN 0-89471-136-9)

The books by Dunbar and Santore have been very useful for different reasons.  Dunbar’s book is about building Windsor chairs using traditional hand tools and working with green wood.  This was my inspiration to try making Windsor chairs.  I also have adapted the leg and shield seat drawings (basically, Dunbar’s continuous arm chair from the seat to the floor) in my own chairs.  Santore’s book is about Windsor chair styles in different parts of colonial America and at different times.  It has a lot of photos and I particularly liked three of the comb-back arm chairs.  Their proportions and details are the inspiration for the upper part of my chairs (above the seat).

The three books by Evans are fascinating reading.  They are a veritable encyclopedia of information on the chairs and the chair makers.  Lots of photos.

The book by Moser is about his contemporary Windsor style.  I like it mostly for ideas about how the style has continued to evolve.  Kassay has measured drawings.  These are very helpful in designing your own variation and establishing dimensions.

I have also done this chair with a poplar seat, ash or hickory spindles and the rest in hard maple.  In this case, I used a medium brown stain prior to the clear oil/varnish finish.  The stain was used because the poplar has a greenish cast and does not blend well with the other woods with just a clear finish.  I have made this chair in all blond woods: a seat of elm, thin spindles in hickory and the rest in hard maple.  All three of these woods have a very similar color with the clear finish.  I have done a few in cherry (with ash or oak thin spindles).  I like the look, but the cherry arms are a bit brittle and prone to cracking.  The picture at the top shows maple/elm, cherry and walnut versions of the chair (left to right).

I will be doing a chair with a butternut seat.  The other woods have not been chosen, but I am leaning toward either walnut for everything but the spindles (they would be hickory) or doing everything but the seat in hickory.  I think that I’ll try turning a leg in hickory before I decide.

I’d also like to try a continuous arm chair.  That would mean a new rig for steaming the long, continuous arm since my current steamer is too small (short) for the 60 inch plus length of the continuous arm.  I’m also toying with the idea of doing a form bent lamination for the continuous arm.  This experimenting is part of what makes chair making fun.

Notes –

There are some steps that are not illustrate:

1.  The finishing of the crest

2.  Fitting of spindles to seat (the angles tenon).

3.  Some of undercarriage assembly.

Should these be added to update the story?