Pro Shop: When the teacher becomes the student
Passing along your knowledge brings you more than just some extra cash
By Michael Doerr
Through my career as a furniture maker, I have been asked many questions about basic woodworking, design theory, and my approach and relationship to my work. These queries have opened a long-running dialogue with a variety of people from diverse professions and disciplines. The process has also helped me understand my work, and how and why I approach it in my style. With these questions and conversations came the realization that I've created a very teachable approach to chair design and construction techniques.
These questions have opened different doors and pathways, such as talks and slide shows, day- and weekend-long demonstrations of chair design at local woodworking clubs and woodworking stores, at the high school and university level, and a placement on the faculty of the Peninsula Art School in Fish Creek, Wis. I also offer a weeklong class in which people come to my shop to build their own chair.
Designing ways
Influenced by master woodworkers such as shipwright Ferdinand (Red) Nimphius, who taught me wooden boatbuilding, and chair maker Sam
Maloof, who inspired me with his sculptural techniques and joinery at
Anderson Ranch, Snow Mass, Colo., I started to design and produce a line of handcrafted furniture, specializing in functional chairs. All pieces are produced in-shop for individual clients personally, from the selection of wood, to the finished sanding and oiling.
In the intervening years a production system developed. After laying out the wooden blocks needed to build a chair, I look at the grain flow, color and pattern of each block to comprehend how they will interact with each other. This study gives one the ability to create a very uniform appearance to a single chair or a complete dining set. With these blocks joined together in a dry fitted cube, I begin the design by drawing on the wood itself, or by cutting a pattern from cardboard and holding it in profile to the exterior of the block form. I prefer to draw on the wood and view the curves over time, looking at them and turning them in my mind's eye to see their relationship with the whole design concept. This internal dialogue is an integral part of my relationship with design.
My appearance on the cover of Woodshop News (January 2001) brought questions from a national level, with one person in particular asking if he could come to my shop and learn chair construction. At first I was reluctant to have someone in my shop. However, after researching insurance ramifications, talking with my agent and removing this concern, I started to appreciate the value of teaching in my own environment. I accepted my first in-shop student in early spring 2001, and have continued allowing people to come and learn about my approach to chair design. As these individuals have come to learn, they have taught me much about teaching techniques and how to express myself. Some have stayed friends, others have come and gone to produce chairs for their clients, using the sculptural techniques I taught them. The value in teaching is not only monetary — though the cash flow created by these weeklong lessons does help in the overall running of my business.
The shop stays open
I am able to teach and produce product at the same time. I have the blocks of wood prepared for the students before they arrive. Then they follow me through the building process. We take time to discuss design theory and how the individual blocks are fitted together, with thought about grain flow and pattern. What I am trying to give students is not the ability to copy one of my chairs, but the ability to create a chair of their own. A great satisfaction comes as you watch your techniques and design ideas become real in the hands of others. There is a point in every chair-building process that a chair leaves the block form and becomes a functional chair.
As woodworkers study design and crafts, and turn their own ideas into finished product, they start to reach through history to commune with the craftspeople that have gone before. I had the great experience of working for Nimphius, who helped me to understand the value of passing on information to others. Not only are we expressing ourselves through craft, but the artifacts we leave for others to study and understand is our legacy for the future, and our connection to the past.
With their chair in hand, students leave my shop ready to explore their own designs. The many follow-up questions help me to continue the process of thinking at a teaching level, and why in my designs I have used a curve over a straight line or vice versa. This reexamination has taught me not to protect a design, but to explore it. I cannot say if teaching is right for all who read this, but if you have a willingness to explore your own work then I highly recommend it.
Plan ahead
When thinking about teaching in your own shop remember that these students will be using their vacation time. They will appreciate working with you, but have their own expectations. Some students will bring their own tools. I allow the use of my tools, but contact your insurance agent if you have concerns. Have information for them on hotels in different price ranges and directions to your shop. Think about lunch and how long they want to work per day, still maintaining your production schedule. This will differ depending on age and skill level. What you want to do is give a good all-around experience.
I live in Door County, Wis., on a peninsula that points northeast into Lake Michigan. The county has much scenic beauty and is a year-round tourist destination. If you live in such a place, some of your students may combine your class with their family vacation.
When teaching away from your shop — in places such as stores, clubs and art schools — consider travel time, the cost of materials needed for the demonstration, food and lodging.
As Nimphius once said as we were planking a boat together, "It's not what you accomplish in a day, but what you learn." Teaching has been painless for the most part, and has brought on many changes. If you decide to teach, good luck, and may you find it a good experience.
Michael Doerr is owner of a one-man shop, Doerr Woodworking, in Sturgeon Bay, Wis.