Return to Home
* This class has prerequisites. See below.
In this culminating segment of BARN's Beginning Woodworking series, you will build a small, Shaker-style table suitable as a lamp stand or night stand that incorporates some of your own design elements.
This class is designed for students who know the basics of using hand and power tools but want to develop those skills more and learn to take a project through all of the steps from initial idea through finished project. This class includes:
Details:
----------------------------------------------------
Short-sleeve or tight-cuff tops and close-toe comfortable shoes are required. No jewelry other than "button-type" earrings for women is allowed, so no rings, bracelets, necklaces. Long hair must be tied back.
Get a good foundation in carving techniques, including push, stop and draw cuts. In this three-session class, you will learn the basics of safe handling and use of carving knives the first night, then go on to learn how to deal with changes in wood grain, hollowing techniques, and other concepts as you make a spoon and carve a figure during second and third sessions.
This class is open to both beginning carvers and those who already have some carving experience. Each time BARN schedules this class, the carving projects are new.
Instructor: As a third-generation woodworker, Jeff Iller learned about woodworking tools and knives early on. By high school, he was winning ribbons with his wood carvings at his hometown fair. Around 1996 Jeff found room for a shop and he has carved ever since. He’ll carve most anything, but prefers to innovate with the working tools to carve multiple parts inside one piece of wood and to make physically detailed and accurate carvings of women's faces. Carvings on the entry sign to the BARN Woodworking Studio shows the quality of his work.
Iller says he was taught early on that he could make anything from wood. He is still trying to prove that statement wrong.
* This class has prerequisites. Please see below.
With their interlocking nature, mortise and tenon joints are among the strongest ways to link two pieces of wood together when the grain direction runs in opposite ways. But to work correctly, both sides of the joint need to be cut precisely right.
This two-session class focuses on making four different styles of these joints, using the vertical mortiser, the table saw tenoning jig, the Festool Domino cutter, and the router table.
On the first day, you will learn how to lay out these joints, using marking gauges and rulers. You will then cut mortises two ways — with the vertical mortiser and with a drill press and chisels. You will cut tenons with the tenoning jig on the table saw. On the second day, you will learn how to cut haunched tenons and why you might want them, and you will learn how to use two tools — the Domino cutter and the router table — that each can make all the cuts you need for mortise and tenon joinery.
The focus of this class is on learning the techniques. You will go home with samples, not a complete project. The instructor will challenge each student to cut each style of joint using custom dimensions, ensuring that everyone gets a chance to learn to adjust the tool settings to match different depths and widths.
* This class is open to woodworkers 14+ years old who have competed Woodshop Tool Safety Checkout 1 and Woodshop Tool Safety Checkout 2. If you have not already taken them, please register for them before you sign up for this class. If you want to use any of the tools covered in this class during Open Studio time, you also need to take our free Orientation to the Woodshop class.
Instructor: Josh Haza. Josh has been building furniture for his home and doing home renovations for a few decades now. He also built equipment for high school physics classes he taught.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Please avoid dangling jewelry or loose clothing. Long hair must be tied back. Wear close-toe shoes.
This class has been rescheduled to Saturday, January 18 and Sunday, January 19th. Please click here to register for the January class.
------------------------------------
** This class has prerequisites. Please see below.
Make two bowls 6 to 7 inches in diameter in this two-session class as you build your woodturning skills and learn some of the special techniques and insights needed for bowl-turning.
The best (and most fun) way to hone your bowl-turning skills is to use green wood for the blanks. In this class you will turn two green-wood bowls, working on smooth and efficient cuts. In the first session, you will learn the best bowl shape for a novice turner, how to safely mount the blank on the lathe, and how to use of a scroll chuck and bowl gouge. You will also learn how to maintain even wall thickness, and how to treat the bowl to prevent cracking while it dries. In the second session, in addition to turning a second bowl, you will learn the basics about balancing grain and which Northwest woods are best for turning.
By successfully completing these two sessions and turning two bowls, you will have a good understanding of the process and techniques, and be qualified to turn bowls of this size independently during Open Studio time in the BARN Woodworking Studio.
Photograph by Joy McCallister Photography.
Instructor: Jamie Straw has been turning wood for several years, working on both spindle and bowl projects, and has taught woodturning at BARN since July 2017. She also serves as coordinator of BARN’s woodturning classes. She is past Vice President for Education and Training for the local chapter of the American Association of Woodturners. Her focus is on helping students build skills progressively as they design and create their woodturning projects.
Get checked out on the Woodworking Studio’s major power tools not covered in the Tools 1 safety class. This Tools 2 safety class may be taken without first having taken the Tools 1 safety class. Provided you have also attended our free Orientation to the Woodshop class, completing Woodshop Tool Safety 2 will qualify you to use the following tools during Open Studio time or in classes that have this as a prerequisite:
Instructor: Jeanne Huber
Designed as a user's guide to BARN's Woodworking & Small Boatbuilding Studio, this free orientation session is required for all who wish to work in the Woodworking Studio. It will cover everything from shop etiquette to specifics of how to use the shop's dust collection and compressed air systems. Overall BARN policies, as well as shop-specific ones, will also be covered.
Participants will also learn about the leadership structure within the shop and about opportunities to participate in helping everything run smoothly. Volunteer jobs range from serving as safety monitors to helping on Maintenance Mondays.
This class is free, but please register so we know how many to expect.
Instructor: Jeff Williams
To use the shop, you will also need to attend our free one-hour Orientation to the Woodshop class.
Woodshop Tool Safety 1 will qualify you to use the following tools during Open Studio time and in classes that require certification in these tools:
Instructor: Mike Morgan
Learn the fundamentals of making beautiful wooden pens as you also learn safe use of a lathe to make small wooden objects using carbide turning tools.
The instructor will discuss the basic concepts of turning, using the modern pen as a model. You will use the drill press to prepare your turning blanks. Then, depending on the experience level of students in the class, the instructor will work out a schedule so that each student gets sufficient lathe time and one-on-one attention to complete a pen.
Tuition assistance is available. Click here to apply.
This is a BARN holiday. Doors will be locked to members and non-members.
Take a break from holiday hubbub and spend some time carving! This informal event is designed so you can bring guests and family along and spend a pleasurable afternoon exploring this craft and making something together.
Master Carver Jeff Iller will have ideas and materials for shallow relief carvings — simple projects that even beginners can make. He'll guide you in how to carve safely and efficiently.
Iller will be in the shop three afternoons — Friday, Saturday and Monday, Dec. 27, 28 and 30. Each day is listed separately on the BARN calendar so you can sign up for one or more sessions, as you wish.
Instructor: As a third-generation woodworker, Jeff Iller learned about woodworking tools and knives early on. By high school, he was winning ribbons with his wood carvings at his hometown fair. Around 1996 Jeff found room for a shop and he has carved ever since. He’ll carve most anything, but he especially enjoys carving multiple parts inside a single piece of wood and making physically detailed and accurate carvings of women's faces. Carving on the entry sign to the BARN Woodworking Studio shows the quality of his work.
Get started on your woodturning adventure with this three-session beginner's class, where you’ll complete small spindle projects as you learn safety, tool control and how to create the basic shapes involved in spindle and bowl turning.
By successfully completing this class and our free, one-hour Orientation to the Woodshop class, you will be cleared to use the wood lathes for spindle turning during Open Studio. You will also be eligible to take a bowl-turning class, although it is strongly suggested that you spend time turning in Open Studio a few times before you enroll in that class. (Note that you still must take Tool Safety Classes before using other power tools in the Studio.)
Apparel: Short-sleeve or tight-cuff tops and closed-toe and comfortable shoes are required. No bracelets or necklaces; earrings must be no longer than 1". Long hair must be tied back.
Spend a holiday-week morning immersed in the world of wood engraving with Tony Drehfal, the Bloedel Reserve's visiting artist for the month of December. His free presentation promises to be of particular interest to printmakers, woodworkers and anyone captivated by the incredible detail possible with this art form.
The presentation is free but please register because the room capacity is limited.
Hailing from northern Wisconsin, Drehfal has been creating nature-themed wood engravings for nearly 20 years, ever since he attended a week-long class in West Virginia and began to tap into the resources offered by the Wood Engravers Network. You can see examples of his work at his website, www.tonydrehfal.com.
Wood engraving developed as a craft toward the end of the 18th century as a way to add detailed illustrations to letterpress prints. Unlike regular woodcuts, which are cut into the sides of boards, wood engravings are made into the end grain of very dense wood, such as English boxwood or holly. Instead of using regular woodcarving tools, wood engravers use tools called burins, which are like those used to engrave metal. Wood engravers usually carve blocks 0.918 of an inch thick, the height of metal type. That allows the engravings to be set alongside type in letterpress printing (including the letterpress at BARN).
Drehfal will show examples of his work and that of other engravers as he discusses the history of the craft and where it is headed now. He'll also explain some of the tools that engravers use, including spitstickers (a kind of burin) and leather-covered sandbags, which support wood blocks during engraving.
Instructor: TBD
No experience necessary. We will be on hand to help as needed.
Start a project, finish a project, or just play with wood and see what happens. We will have some extra wood available or bring in your own.
Build one or more birdhouses of your own design as you learn to use hand woodworking tools safely, efficiently and with precision.
In this class you will learn what different kinds of birds need in a birdhouse. You will then design one that will attract the type of bird you choose — and has the artistic elements you want.
Then, to make your birdhouse, you will learn how to "read" a board to choose the best places to cut specific parts, how to use measuring and marking tools, how to choose and use the appropriate saw to cut out parts, how to smooth the parts and square up edges with hand planes, and how to attach the parts to make a sturdy birdhouse.
The birdhouses will be made of pine, which doesn't have the risk of allergies that can develop from working with cedar. Pine stands up fine in the weather as long as the wood isn't on soggy ground — a non-issue for a birdhouse perched on a pole or attached to a tree.
Instructor: Matt Carrig. Matt is a multi-disciplinary designer and the originator of the Ferries Over Winslow project, which you can read about here. He is also a safety monitor in the BARN woodworking studio.
This class will introduce you to Japanese tools and ways of working wood, which are very different from those that evolved in the West. The emphasis is on learning to use the tools, rather than building a specific project. All of the work will be on sample pieces.
Japanese-style chisels and planes never arrive ready to use; they always require fine-tuning first. If you want to learn how to set up your own tools, you can also do that through this class.
You will learn:
Instructor: Gary Bella grew up in western Pennsylvania. After college and art school, he moved to the Bay Area in California and began working in Marin County with several firms in residential construction. Later, he specialized in finish carpentry while developing a design/build business. He took classes with traditional Japanese teahouse carpenter Makoto Imai and later worked primarily with Makoto building traditional houses and tea houses in California, New York and Washington. After he moved to Bainbridge in 2003, he continued to build Japanese-inspired projects for private clients. He was among the craftsmen who restored the Japanese guest house at the Bloedel Reserve.
Please wear close-toe shoes. Long hair must be tied back.
Learn to carve shallow designs so they look like 3-D objects with far more depth — an essential skill if you want to carve a wall decoration, a sign by the front door, a plaque or other relief carving.
You will start with the basic shape cut out from basswood, allowing you to skip the tedious time needed to carve away the background. This frees more class time for developing techniques for creating the embellishments that bring a relief carving to life.
You will be able to choose one or more designs from among those that the instructor will provide. If you've taken this class before, you will be able to carve something new this time. Your materials fee includes the cost of the basswood blanks.
Instructor: As a third-generation woodworker, Jeff Iller learned about woodworking tools and knives early on. By high school, he was winning ribbons with his wood carvings at his hometown fair. Around 1996 Jeff found room for a shop and he has carved ever since. He’ll carve most anything, but prefers to innovate with the working tools to carve multiple parts inside one piece of wood and to make physically detailed and accurate carvings of women's faces.
He was taught early on that he could make anything from wood and he is still trying to prove that statement wrong.
What distinguishes well-designed furniture? In part, that depends on what you want the furniture to do. Is it art? Or is it functional? Or both — or is that even possible?
In this four-session class, you will learn about design trends in hand-made and factory-made furniture, and how the materials available have shaped designs over the years. You will also learn about proportion, ergonomics, the psychology of shape, and the importance of understanding the properties of the materials you use.
With all that as the base, the instructor will discuss the process he uses to come up with designs that art galleries are eager to display. And he will guide you as you develop an original design based on what you have to work with — materials, skills, tools, workspace, budget. The process, if you follow the instructor's lead, will include hand sketching, a computer drawing using a program such as SketchUp, a physical model made of simple materials, and a work plan that includes the sequence of fabrication and assembly.
Instructor: Warren Pollock. Warren is a registered architect noted for his modernist designs. He worked for several design firms as well as his own over a 50-year career that began after he graduated with a bachelor of architecture degree from the University of Washington in 1968. He designed houses, offices, multi-family, mixed-use and retail projects through Warren Pollock and Associates and later Warren Pollock Architect, both in Seattle. Interspersed were stints at MulvanneyG2 Architecture and Su Development, both in Bellevue, and Metrica Architects in Seattle, a firm he helped found that also had an office in Bogota, Columbia. After retiring from architecture, he became active in the BARN Woodworking Studio. Tables he built have been featured and sold at a local gallery.
Effective and enjoyable woodturning is dependent on sharp tools that have quality profiles. Learn to sharpen the tools you need to turn spindles, bowls and other projects on the wood lathe.
This class is strongly recommended for students enrolled in Introduction to Bowl Turning and graduates of Introduction to Woodturning. This class is required for any turners who wish to use BARN turning tools on an ongoing basis. You will receive hands-on training for sharpening gouges (spindle and bowl), and a brief overview of sharpening other tools such as parting tools, skews and scrapers.
Bring in your steel-string acoustic or electric guitar and learn how to get it sounding and playing its best.
We'll start with a refresher on terminology and the factors that impact tone and playability. Then we'll evaluate the instruments for structural integrity and discuss the importance of temperature and humidity control. (Please note that if your instrument is deemed to need more than a basic setup, you'll be offered a refund or the option of working on another instrument.)
Then comes the hands-on tweaking of truss rods for perfect neck relief, nut and bridge adjustments for great action, and saddle adjustment for intonation improvements.
Electric guitar players will also learn how to adjust their pickups.
Finally, we'll discuss string differences, put on a set of fresh strings, and test out our improvements. You'll go home with a better guitar, a better understanding of how it works, and a checklist for future reference.
Instructor: Doug Salot started playing the guitar about 10 years ago and occasionally tries to distract himself by building guitars and ukuleles. He studied instrument building with local luthier Alan Simcoe.
Please note: The registration deadline for this class is Jan. 7, 2020.
Learn to make a 16-foot, strip-built cedar kayak from start to its fiberglass finish with guidance from Joe Greenley, designer of the beautiful boats sold by Redfish Custom Kayak and Canoe Co. in Port Townsend.
There is no materials fee because the boat will be sold when it is complete. There may also be space for a limited number of students to build kayaks to take home, but these students must purchase the necessary materials. A kit for the Spring Run model, the class project, costs $1,695.
The class is ideal for beginning woodworkers, as well as more seasoned woodworkers who want to enhance their skills in hand tools and experience the camaraderie of working on wooden boats as a team. With minimum power tool use, students will focus on using planes, spoke shaves and various measuring tools to achieve a high degree of craftsmanship.
The class will provide a strong base for anyone who wants to build a kayak on their own or with friends or family.
Students will be encouraged to work on the boat between sessions, during Open Studio time. To participate in that, you must first complete our free, one-hour Orientation to the Woodshop class. Open Studio time is always free for members. Non-members who are working on a class project can also participate without an additional fee.
Instructor: Joe Greenley, founder of Redfish Custom Kayak and Canoe Co. in Port Townsend.
Did you ever wonder how to get a really professional-looking finish on your woodworking project? In this hands-on class, you will learn about different types of wood stains and clear finishes and get a chance to experiment with them on a sample board that you can take home and use for future reference.
The class is four sessions to allow drying time as you go through all of the steps, from preparing the surface to applying stain and finish, to rubbing out the finish. You will learn how to prepare the surface to help ensure an excellent finish, which stains and finishes work best on different types of solid wood and plywood, and which tools and techniques to use when applying stains and finishes by hand (ie, without spraying). You will also learn which products are compatible with one another — and which ones aren't.
"With her professional background, Carol provides you with information that takes you beyond the easy way out of Minwax products at the big box store to the world of waterborne finishes vs alcohol-based or petroleum-based products. You get to see and work with a variety of wood species and grain patterns using penetrating and topical finish products and — what was most exciting — dyes. Most importantly you get the instructions in what not to do as well as what works for you. This is a level of information and hands-on trial that every serious woodwork needs to experience."
— Jeff Williams, former BARN woodshop lead
Instructor: Carol Fiedler Kawaguchi is a professional woodworker who specializes in restoration of antique furniture through her business, C-Saw, on Bainbridge Island. She also makes custom furniture, including the slab coffee table in the Commons at BARN.
Help build one or two Japanese-style workbenches for the BARN woodworking shop as you learn to use Japanese-style layout tools, saws, planes and chisels.
This class will focus on making the trestle supports, which have mortise-and-tenon joinery. To complete the workbenches, a pair of these supports will hold one or two thick beams that serves as the work surface, plus a thinner board for tools. The top of the beams is considerably lower than the top of a Western-style workbench, making it much more efficient for use with Japanese-style tools.
Please avoid dangling jewelry or loose clothing. Long hair must be tied back.
Gain confidence in using a wide array of power tools safely in this three-week component of BARN's Intro to Woodworking series.
You will build a sturdy, two-step stepstool of solid wood and plywood. The project was specifically designed to give you experience with the most common stationary and portable tools in the woodshop:
