When I started out as a furniture maker, one of the people I turned to for advice and guidance was a furniture maker named Alan Peters. Alan had a wonderful workshop in Kentisbeare, less than an hour from where I now live and work. When I met Alan, he was in London trying to figure out how to do this, and he had what I wanted. He had a workshop in the country, he had two exceptional fabricators, he had a market for his work, and he had a reputation as a contemporary furniture maker of quality and integrity. And all this I wanted.

When I met Alan, I went there for a week-long course he taught over the summer. He invited about four or five of us to his workshop during the summer months when his staff was on vacation. He prepared materials for us and we made a small cabinet with doors and a drawer. First of all, he surprised me by how much we accomplished in such a relatively short time. That was later, I think, explained by the fact that this was a professional workshop, not really a teaching workshop. Allan was used to the speed and efficiency in creating it, he did it himself and expected the same from others.

I remember being a real pain in the butt during that week. I was the first in the morning scratching the door of Alan’s workshop at seven and the last to leave at closing time. I saw the tiredness in his eyes, but I still kept pumping. I had someone in front of me who knew everything I didn’t and wanted to get to every syllable of that knowledge.

I could tell that Alan was patient and kind, especially to someone he felt was worth the effort. But to be honest, he could be abrasive and short-tempered. He had little time for incompetence and more than once he told me “stop fooling around, cut it once and quit.” But his speed and skill with hand tools left a big impression on me. This man knew how to get things done and get them done fast. He didn’t need machines to cut straight, like I did, and he could work in the silence of the shop without screaming machines and dusty air to ruin his day. He hated the scream of a router in the bank store, it visibly annoyed him.

Alan Peters taught me during that week and subsequent times that I worked with him most of the really important things that I now know about woodworking. But the one thing I didn’t really listen to was his advice about the wood. Alan Peters had lots and lots of different species of hardwood. He invested money, time and energy in that resource because, like me, he didn’t know if the next thing he would do would be a cathedral door or a jewelry box. I saw this investment of time and money and thought I wouldn’t do it. I’ll be smart and buy kiln-dried material when I need it. When I know I need 12-foot ash boards for the cathedral door, I’ll go buy them.

Big mistake Alan. Due to his resource of air-dried stock piles, he always had the Oak hand that cuts like hard cheese and Ash that would plane to finish from the blade. My mistake has been to condemn my creators to work with material that has died in the drying process. Baked dry stuff you have to fight, eventually you get there but it’s a fight. It doesn’t give you the results like air dry if you just approach it properly with keen knowledge and respectful manner.

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