These images are from the April 2009 Out of Square course

Studio furniture is where art meets function in furniture.

Seth enjoys making both simple and complex furniture and, especially,  relishes the challenge of creating new designs. The problem solving associated with turning a new design into a finished piece is his favorite part of the being a furnituremaker.

Making complex curved elements for a piece of furniture is always a challenge. How do you make a smoothly curved pedestal?  Do I need to steam bend or laminate this curved piece?

This course is intended to push experienced woodworkers to experiment with new forms and non-rectilinear shapes.  This course will start with a review of challenging and provocative furniture. We'll look at how to design and how to generate curved forms. We'll encourage you to think of shapes or forms that you want to make but have never dared,and we will work with you figure out the best way to make them. 

We will take those rough ideas, explore their possibilities and refine them with models and prototypes.  Through these exercises and demonstrations you will increase your vocabulary by adding new forms, techniques and shapes to you repertoire.

Make your mistakes early and often! The emphasis will be on building prototypes - all the work in the week will be done with cheap materials so that you will feel free to experiment.  We will not be trying to make one finished product, but instead focussing on  the design processes and techniques that you will use on all your future pieces.

Experience requirements
Just how much experience do you need? The answer is not much.

Seth emphasizes that if you have skills in other visual arts - pottery, sculpture, painting or drawing you'll find that experience helps. You need some woodworking experience but not a lot. You should be comfortable using a bandsaw and a table saw.

The course is not about fine joinery or fine woodworking. Seth teaches pragmatic quick methods for making and joining curved forms.

Images of Seth and his work:

Class size:             10 
Cost:                       $650  (Minimum enrollment 6)
Materials Charge:  $35 (plus you'll buy your project wood at Edensaw during the course)