I was staring at a slab of walnut last Tuesday, surrounded by the usual graveyard of rejected prototypes, when I realized I’d almost ruined the whole thing. I had been…

I spent three weeks last autumn staring at a slab of black walnut, convinced that its grain pattern was the soul of the chair I was building. I had the…

I was digging through a box of rejected walnut joinery prototypes in my studio last Tuesday—one of those piles I can’t quite bring myself to throw away—when I realized how…

I have a shelf in my studio dedicated entirely to the “failures”—the chair legs that were too thick, the joints that bit too deep, and the prototypes that simply didn’t…

I was staring at a stack of failed joinery samples in my studio last Tuesday—the ones I’ve kept in a corner for years—when I realized how much we lie to…

I have a shelf in my studio dedicated entirely to the “failures”—the joints that were too fussy, the wood species that wouldn’t hold a grain, and the silhouettes that looked…

I spent three weeks in 2004 obsessing over the lumbar sweep of a walnut lounge chair, only to realize I had built a beautiful, expensive torture device. I still have…

I was staring at a prototype of a lounge chair last Tuesday—one of the many “failures” currently occupying a corner of my studio—realizing that the industry’s obsession with ergonomic data…

I was staring at a prototype for a walnut sideboard last Tuesday, surrounded by the usual graveyard of failed ideas, when it hit me again. We spend so much time…

I spent most of yesterday morning digging through a cardboard box in the corner of my studio, pulling out a series of bent plywood joints that look more like modern…