Shop Drawings for Craftsman Furniture: 27 Stickley Designs for Every Room in the Home

Rating:
Summary: "Shop Drawings" useful and fun
Review: Ever since building our first piece of "Stickley" style furniture I've been looking for a book with more ideas. This one certainly filled the bill. Given the time, I could outfit my whole house with these attractive pieces! Mr. Lang's style helped make it an enjoyable read while his hints and advice came in useful from the start. An added benefit was the facinating history of the Stickley company. It really gave me some insight as to the designs.

Rating:
Summary: "Shop Drawings" useful and fun
Review: Ever since building our first piece of "Stickley" style furniture I've been looking for a book with more ideas. This one certainly filled the bill. Given the time, I could outfit my whole house with these attractive pieces! Mr. Lang's style helped make it an enjoyable read while his hints and advice came in useful from the start. An added benefit was the facinating history of the Stickley company. It really gave me some insight as to the designs.

Rating:
Summary: Highly recommended do-it-yourself guide
Review: Professional cabinet maker and draftsman Bob Lang's Shop Drawings For Craftsman Furniture: 27 Stickley Designs For Every Room In The Home is an a draft book filled with precise, exacting line drawings that can be used as models to create a wide variety of elegant and practical home furnishings. A beginning section aptly introduces novice builders to the art of interpreting shop drawings, and the drawings themselves come with brief commentary and instructions. Overall, Shop Drawings For Craftsman Furniture is a superbly presented, highly recommended do-it-yourself guide, and especially useful for building a handmade holiday gift when store-bought gifts just won't do.

Rating:
Summary: Experience Required!
Review: There are a lot of books about making Arts and Crafts furniture, but only a few really good ones. Some offer inspiration, some offer detailed instructions, and all offer a brief history of the Arts and Crafts movement. Very few offer the kind of detailed drawings it takes to really build the furniture pictured.
I'll confess that I haven't built a piece from this book yet, it's simply too new, but a review of the drawings tells me that I could start on a piece tomorrow knowing that the dimensions are accurate.
Here's where the experience part comes in. There are no step by step instructions. It is up to the reader to interpret the drawings, decide on the construction techniques to use and plan the project before starting. This book won't tell you the order in which to assemble the parts you make, you'll decide that, among many other decisions. To me, that's part of the fun and challenge of building furniture.
If you are inexperienced in building furniture, buy this book for future projects and also buy one with some detailed instructions in it for your first few pieces. (I'd recommend "Authentic Arts and Crafts Furniture Projects" by the editors of "Popular Woodworking" magazine.)

Rating:
Summary: Experience Required!
Review: There are a lot of books about making Arts and Crafts furniture, but only a few really good ones. Some offer inspiration, some offer detailed instructions, and all offer a brief history of the Arts and Crafts movement. Very few offer the kind of detailed drawings it takes to really build the furniture pictured.
I'll confess that I haven't built a piece from this book yet, it's simply too new, but a review of the drawings tells me that I could start on a piece tomorrow knowing that the dimensions are accurate.
Here's where the experience part comes in. There are no step by step instructions. It is up to the reader to interpret the drawings, decide on the construction techniques to use and plan the project before starting. This book won't tell you the order in which to assemble the parts you make, you'll decide that, among many other decisions. To me, that's part of the fun and challenge of building furniture.
If you are inexperienced in building furniture, buy this book for future projects and also buy one with some detailed instructions in it for your first few pieces. (I'd recommend "Authentic Arts and Crafts Furniture Projects" by the editors of "Popular Woodworking" magazine.)