I work wood by hand, one piece at a time.

Curled shavings of pale and dark wood piled on the bench

Hand tools set the pace. You slow down to the speed of your hands and start to read the grain, board by board. That close understanding of wood only comes from working it this way. It’s the part of the craft I love most.

I use traditional joinery, and a few machines where they make sense. Nothing is made in batches. Each piece gets its own board and its own decisions.

Tools

  • A mallet with a spalted wood head, held up in one hand
    Spalted mallet
  • A joiner’s mallet on a pine workbench, a hand plane behind it
    Joiner’s mallet
  • Two turned wooden handles side by side, one reddish, one with dark swirling grain
    Turned handles
  • A long-handled mallet with a dark head, lying in the grass
    Long-handled mallet

The wood is cherry, walnut, maple and pine from local suppliers. Finishes are natural: linseed oil and beeswax.

Pieces

  • A small desk with a drawer under a window, a laptop on top
    Desk with a drawer
  • A pine box with a curved back and a drawer with a dark wooden pull
    Box with a drawer
  • A dark butterfly key set across the joint between two pale boards
    Butterfly key
  • A long box with its lid set aside, shavings on the bench around it
    Lidded box
  • A pale solid wood top on a standing desk frame
    Desk top
  • Wooden rings among shavings on a board, in warm light
    Rings
  • A small pine ledge holding chalk under a chalkboard that reads Skoba Studio
    Chalk ledge
Me at my workbench, working on a piece held in the vise, saws on the wall behind

Woodworking runs on both sides of my family. I came back to it in 2016, through an old rusty chisel I found and couldn’t leave alone.

Skoba (скоба) is Bulgarian for clamp, or holdfast. It also means bracket.

We say to open a bracket when we start a side story. I think side stories are worth following. You never know which one becomes the main one.

Now and then a piece is ready to leave the workshop. If you’d like one, write to me at rob@worbee.com.