{"id":47,"date":"2008-12-14T16:48:00","date_gmt":"2008-12-14T16:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/beginnings\/"},"modified":"2013-04-22T22:07:57","modified_gmt":"2013-04-22T22:07:57","slug":"beginnings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/beginnings\/","title":{"rendered":"Beginnings"},"content":{"rendered":"
I’ve been working for myself making furniture for a living since April of 1982 when I was only 22 years old. I really had no idea what I was getting into when I decide I was going to be a furniture maker. I’d read a couple of books about woodworking by James Krenov (A Cabinet Makers Notebook<\/em> may have been the first)<\/em> that made woodworking seem really romantic – working in a small basement shop making fine pieces with beautiful yet simple details. Choosing the wood carefully paying attention to grain and color. Painstakingly cut dovetails and hand planed surfaces.<\/p>\n

So I’d read a few books, bought a few tools (an 8″ tables saw and 4″ jointer, a router and sander, a 7″ planer) taken a very basic evening woodworking class and made a few very simple pieces on the side while working as a carpenter for about a year and a half. By that point I decided I pretty much knew it all and so decided to start my own business – Richard Bissell Fine Woodworking<\/a>. I quit my carpentry job and moved my tools into the basement of my parents vacation house in Putney, Vermont and hung a sign at the end of the driveway. Only after I’d done this did I come to the realization that nobody knew I even existed (as far as woodworking was concerned) and that I really had no idea how to change that. Quite a scary realization.<\/p>\n

As it turned out I didn’t know a heck of a lot about woodworking either but I wasn’t aware of that and as it turned out I had plenty of time to hone my skills while trying to figure out how to sell things. I believe my first sale was a crude file cabinet for a friend had seen one I’d made for my brother. It was frame and panel construction with oak frames and 1\/4″ luaun plywood for the panels. The drawer fronts were oak as well and if I remember correctly the drawer boxes were made of 1\/2″ or mayby 3\/4″ plywood. In hindsight it was a hideous piece but it did hold files and the drawers went in and out. <\/p><\/div>\n

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Anyway, that’s how I got started making furniture. Fortunately I was very young and I’d read a few books that made furniture making sound very noble so I stuck with it. I’m glad I did. It’s a wonderful way to make a living and I’m fortunate enough to do it in a wonderful place to live – Vermont.<\/p>\n

My plan is to use this blog to give readers an idea of what it’s like to be a furniture maker and to show what goes into making a well made piece of furniture. I’ll also present new designs here and show work in progress so please check back regularly.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve been working for myself making furniture for a living since April of 1982 when I was only 22 years old. I really had no idea what I was getting into when I decide I was going to be a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-furniture-making","category-shaker-furniture"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3pgLw-L","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79,"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47\/revisions\/79"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bissellwoodworking.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}