Popular Woodworking 2003-11 № 137, страница 34

Home and Shop Together

The woodshop is connected to the Colonial-style home via a screened-in breezeway. In the office Bird shares with Linda is a stunning 18th-century reproduction slant-front desk, which Bird built. Next to this is an 18th-century reproduction Pennsylvania armchair, which Bird also built. They're timeless pieces so beautiful you wonder why access to them is not limited by a velvet rope.

The furniture contrasts greatly to the gray Office Depot-esque computer desk that holds two computer monitors and a split, ergonomic keyboard - perhaps the only mass-produced piece in the Bird family's home. Currently Bird is building an 1810 reproduction turned-post bunk bed. This replica of a museum-quality piece is where his daughters, Rebecca, 11, and Sarah, 7, will sleep.

The outside of Bird's three-story wood-shop is similar to his Colonial-style home. Inside, the first story is a shrine to modern machinery and power while the second story is a hand-tool woodworker's dream. (The third story is used for storage.) Bird's skillful use of powerful machines and quality hand tools, along with his careful eye for line and proportion, allow him to create fine pieces of reproduction period furniture.

Bird purposefully designed his woodshop with three floors, keeping the machine room in a walk-out basement (the first floor). This way the bench room, which is on the second floor, stays quiet and clean - ideal when trying to carry on a conversation or teach a class. The third floor is used for storing jigs and fixtures. There's also a bathroom up there, which

Bird stores his collection of hand tools in a traditional 18th-century wall cabinet (that he built), complete with tombstone doors.

keeps Bird and his students out of the house. Thousands of board feet of lumber stay dry in a large barn at the edge of the property, which is also where Linda keeps her horses.

The Bench Room

You can climb a few stairs and enter the wood-shop's bench room via the shop's front door. Or you can enter via the breezeway, which is part of the house's wrap-around porch. There's also a door at the back of the shop. There are seven windows in all, including a window in each door, three windows that

Bird's bench room features lots of windows, nine sturdy workbenches, a sharpening station and a few machines.

line the southwest wall and a large bay window at the front of the shop. On a sunny day, the room fills with natural light.

Eight workbenches, each with its own vise and anti-fatigue mat, face Bird's bench, which is silhouetted by the bay window. Bird allows up to nine students in each class, often giving up his own bench for a student to use. Hand-screw clamps, calipers and spokeshaves frame the bay window, and chisels and carving tools kept in a block of wood line the window's seat. Examples of his work hang on the wall (as you can see below left).

Bird's tool cabinet is a traditional 18th-century wall cabinet with tombstone doors. Inside is his collection of hand tools: bench planes, shoulder planes, a set of hollows and rounds, and dovetail saws.

There is a chop saw, mortiser and drill press in the bench room - three exceptions to the "no machines allowed." Because the machine room is downstairs, these three machines in the bench room help limit up-and-down trips. At the back of the room is a complete sharpening station. Next to it is a small refrigerator, which Bird keeps stocked with bottled water. Overhead fans, along with air conditioning, keep the room cool in the summer. A heater keeps the room warm in the winter.

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