What do you think?
Rate this book
Welcome to Woodworking: 20 Simple & Stylish Projects for Your Home & Garden
Learn the basic carpentry skills needed to furnish your home and garden with beautiful and useful wood items. Twenty accessible, step-by-step projects guide you through the essential techniques without large power tools.
This book contains practical knowledge, including
• how to choose good types of wood and the characteristics of the wood,
• a tool review with an emphasis on hand tools, and
• the methods used to measure, saw, plan, join, carve, and finish your wood creations.
The projects feature clean, modern designs, including knife racks, cutting boards, shelves, stools, bookends, and benches. For those interested in gardening, there are flower tables, plant trellises, and more. The projects include easy-to-follow diagrams, and the levels of difficulty are adapted to readers who aren't used to working with wood, but who like its organic feel and expression.
Explore the skills and techniques that make home carpentry a fun and rewarding craft.
This book contains practical knowledge, including
• how to choose good types of wood and the characteristics of the wood,
• a tool review with an emphasis on hand tools, and
• the methods used to measure, saw, plan, join, carve, and finish your wood creations.
The projects feature clean, modern designs, including knife racks, cutting boards, shelves, stools, bookends, and benches. For those interested in gardening, there are flower tables, plant trellises, and more. The projects include easy-to-follow diagrams, and the levels of difficulty are adapted to readers who aren't used to working with wood, but who like its organic feel and expression.
Explore the skills and techniques that make home carpentry a fun and rewarding craft.
176 pages, Hardcover
First published October 7, 2017
1 person is currently reading
28 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 20, 2021
Perfekt för nybörjaren! Pedagogisk, koncist och inspirerande.
January 16, 2026
Lærerik og oversiktlig. Mange gode tips jeg tar med meg videre! Gleder meg til å teste noen av oppskriftene.
January 13, 2026
A well-laid out presentation with diagrams, illustrations, and photos that make the material accessible to the amateur. This educates about wood types, tool types, and even has a conversion chart. The specific projects look approachable.
May come back to this book in the near future, spring or summer? An herb drying rack, or maybe the stacked garden boxes, a planter, a table?
A couple of cautions - sometimes the text says one thing and the picture shows another. In Sawing (p. 55) the text suggests using a clamp to hold wood on the miter box, but the picture shows sawing right next to an unprotected hand.
In fact, there are an awful lot of pictures of sawing next to a hand holding the wood. P. 53 in particular looks like an ad for what NOT to do - one slip, one distraction, and goodbye thumb? Yikes!
One of the many cool things in this book are discussions of wood types, simple images of tree shapes. Anyone who finds wood appealing will learn things here.
Another inspiring aspect is the descriptions of how to use manual tools, e.g. chisels, instead of electric machines, e.g. specialty saws. There is enough guidance to learn and practice with these before committing to a project. And that makes for a lot of choice and personal touches even for the novice.
---2nd look---
Did return to this book, and recognize that it is as much a peek into the culture as into 'basic skills'. The wood drying rack (pp. 80-83) is very open-air and the levels are 'connected' with loose rope knotted under each layer. So no dust, tall ceilings, no earthquakes/tornadoes/hurricanes? Sure, that's Scandinavia?
A 'bedroom light' attaches a wood fixture to a wood wall. As does the balcony table. Items indoors and out are simple, delicate, so ... tons of wood everywhere, and no bears, no coyotes, wolves, deer, raccoons, possums?
The items are airy, light, as if they are designed for Tolkein's elves. Wait! That's it! Mountains, high altitude ... nope, it's very close to sea level. Northern latitude? Network of islands?
The shoe rack with bench (pp. 118-123) looks delicate. No mat underneath to catch slush or water, a woven seat that is probably plenty strong but looks like a dog would jump right through it. The projects look like they are in a design catalog rather than an active household.
Whether or not one attempts the projects, this is a fun and informative book, inspiring creative thinking on several fronts.
A better title might be Swedish Woodworking Basics. The projects look lovely, for one who has the time and space. (Recommended.)
May come back to this book in the near future, spring or summer? An herb drying rack, or maybe the stacked garden boxes, a planter, a table?
A couple of cautions - sometimes the text says one thing and the picture shows another. In Sawing (p. 55) the text suggests using a clamp to hold wood on the miter box, but the picture shows sawing right next to an unprotected hand.
In fact, there are an awful lot of pictures of sawing next to a hand holding the wood. P. 53 in particular looks like an ad for what NOT to do - one slip, one distraction, and goodbye thumb? Yikes!
One of the many cool things in this book are discussions of wood types, simple images of tree shapes. Anyone who finds wood appealing will learn things here.
Another inspiring aspect is the descriptions of how to use manual tools, e.g. chisels, instead of electric machines, e.g. specialty saws. There is enough guidance to learn and practice with these before committing to a project. And that makes for a lot of choice and personal touches even for the novice.
---2nd look---
Did return to this book, and recognize that it is as much a peek into the culture as into 'basic skills'. The wood drying rack (pp. 80-83) is very open-air and the levels are 'connected' with loose rope knotted under each layer. So no dust, tall ceilings, no earthquakes/tornadoes/hurricanes? Sure, that's Scandinavia?
A 'bedroom light' attaches a wood fixture to a wood wall. As does the balcony table. Items indoors and out are simple, delicate, so ... tons of wood everywhere, and no bears, no coyotes, wolves, deer, raccoons, possums?
The items are airy, light, as if they are designed for Tolkein's elves. Wait! That's it! Mountains, high altitude ... nope, it's very close to sea level. Northern latitude? Network of islands?
The shoe rack with bench (pp. 118-123) looks delicate. No mat underneath to catch slush or water, a woven seat that is probably plenty strong but looks like a dog would jump right through it. The projects look like they are in a design catalog rather than an active household.
Whether or not one attempts the projects, this is a fun and informative book, inspiring creative thinking on several fronts.
A better title might be Swedish Woodworking Basics. The projects look lovely, for one who has the time and space. (Recommended.)
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews