Shop Notes & Rambles
The Rambles are the stories lived and learned over decades — the moments, the lessons, and the shop life that shaped the craft. They accumulate here, sorted by publish date. If you want the curated version, explore the Workshop Library.
The Value of Wood
Woodworking today feels modern and predictable, but every board carries a much older story. To understand the value of wood now, we have to look at a time when survival depended on it. At York Factory in 1817, wood wasn’t a resource — it was life itself. Timber meant heat, shelter, tools, boats, and the ability to endure one of the harshest places in Rupert’s Land. This cornerstone story follows the men who cut spruce in deep winter, hauled timber across frozen muskeg, and rode the spring flood down the Hayes River, revealing the grit, skill, and human effort behind every piece of wood we touch today.
Hardwood vs Softwood
Hardwood vs softwood isn’t just a difference in leaves or needles — it’s the story of how trees survived fire, drought, extinction, and time itself. This piece traces the rise of the two great families of wood, from ancient barren landscapes to the forests we work with today, revealing how evolution shaped every board in the shop and every species in the Wood Archive.
Understanding Wood
Wood behaves the way it does because every board carries the memory of the tree it came from. Leaning trunks, shifting riverbanks, floodwater, wind pressure, scars, tension wood, compression wood — all of it becomes grain, movement, and character in the shop. This piece explains how trees grow, adapt, and survive, and why those hidden forces show up decades later when a woodworker planes a board and the wood reacts. Understanding wood begins with understanding the life it lived.