I have no doubt dear blog readers that you have a good appreciation of quality, probably far more so that the average person in the street for whom quantity seems more important. Does quality have to cost though? Are we just the fortunate few to enjoy quality? A few weeks ago I had to say goodbye to this pair of…
Yesterday the postman brought an unexpected gift from Japan, a big old Japanese saw. It is wonderful condition and sharpened ready to use. This was sent to me by my friend Tomio.When I spent time working with traditional Japanese carpenters last year this was the particular saw that I most coveted. More details and pictures of the saws in Japan…
As craftspeople we put our heart and soul into our work. Most of us make work that only a minority of folk truly understand and appreciate. The most heartwarming thing of all is when we see people enjoying using what we have made in their daily lives, sitting on a chair, drinking from a favourite mug, wearing a scarf we…
Last week I spent 3 days in London for meetings. That’s a London plane leaf by the way, London is full of truly astonishing trees that few folk ever notice. And from an old London landmark to a new one, this is the shard, the first very tall modern building on the South bank, it is going to be pretty…
Today’s blog is simply a very entertaining image that I found on the internet, I just love it and hope you enjoy it too.
One last post on my time with the replica Oseberg ship. I always like to have an overview of this sort of project and share what I have learnt. Often the interest is the detail but the most important things are the big picture about how the worksite works and the project is organised. This is clearly a multimillion pound/dollar…
Well I think it is time for some tool pictures. The tools made for the building of the new Oseberg ship form the largest collection of replica Viking woodworking tools in the world. This is the main tool room. It’s easy to see at a glance whether a tool is missing at the end of the day, this helps when…
This post will mostly be pictures, some of the replica, some of the original Oseberg ship. The last post left a board steamed, bent fitted and riveted or klinked on to the hull. As the hull takes shape each point is measured and set to ±5mm. It can be adjusted slightly by pressing up from underneath with props or by…
Ships built with overlapping planks like Viking ships are called “lapstrake” in the USA, in the UK we call them “clinker built”. I had never known why until I hammered home one of the rivets that is the key to this construction and asked what it’s name was in Norwegian, it’s called a klink and the verb klinking fits perfectly…
So in our next installment in Viking boatbuilding we take the planks that were previously cleft, rough hewn and planed and trial fit them to the boat. Each and every board is different and is an exact replica of a particular board on the original ship. This is the office with the masterplan and to the left you can see…
