Glen Huey

I went to the Woodworking show in York, PA the other weekend. I don’t remember the exact “flavor” of show. This one was sponsored by “Wood” magazine, I believe. Last year, it was an excellent show. Not nearly as crowed as the ones in the Baltimore/DC area and only about 1.5 hours away. Unfortunately, this year, the show was greatly diminished in size. The WoodMizer portable sawmill display was back from last year, but instead of having 10 models set up and operating, there were 2 or 3 and only one was running.

Inside, the show which last year occupied the whole of the expo floor covered only about 60% of it. Most of the displays were local clubs and guilds. Interesting, but…not really to me, since *I* wasn’t local. In particular, gone was the dealer in antique tools that I had been hoping to see. Most of the other vendors were the one trick pony types that fill out the larger winter woodworking shows (Forrest saw blades, The green plastic feather board guy, the guy that sells the thing that hooks on a drill and cuts anything, etc.). Fine products all, I am sure, but I have seen them all before and I am still uninterested. I was hoping for the larger retailers where I could pick up a few odds and ends at “show” prices. I guess it was lucky for me since I had talked my wife into coming with me by promising a drive through the nearby PA Dutch Country region and an early dinner at one of the nice restaurants there.

Still, I wanted something for the effort of getting her up at 8am, into the truck and driving into PA. One of the personalities at this year’s show was Glen Huey. He had his own booth where he was selling books and DVDs. I had thumbed through one of his early books at some time in the past and felt it wasn’t for me. First of all, he seems to focus on the more ornate New England 18th Century stuff that is still far outside my range of skills and not something to the taste of my wife.

However, I was intrigued by his range of how-to DVD products. Several of his offerings were things I felt I could use, but I have seen my share to poor productions and didn’t really want to gamble. On the other hand, he had his new(ish) book there and for $25, I could get a book AND a nearly 90 minute DVD. This seemed like a good deal to me. Even if the DVD was crap, the book had 10 or so projects nicely dissected in full color. And it would let me sample the quality of the DVDs to know if I wanted to buy them or not.

So, I bought it. And I am glad I did. First of all, I prefer to support practitioners by buying their books and I prefer to buy them directly when I can because I know they make more of the money that way. In addition, I could get it signed. I doubt that adds anything to the true value of the book, but I still think it’s cool.

Glenn asked me if I wanted anything in particular written in there and I replied, “No.” He doesn’t know me from Adam and won’t remember me at all in 10 minutes at a busy show. Anything “personal” written there will sound contrived and trite. So, he thought for a moment and wrote, “Make something great,” and signed it. Urf. Hrm. That’s a tall order. But maybe it’s time to stop collecting tools, books, DVDs and wood and actually crank out some stuff. So, Glenn, if you read this (hey, it’s possible) thanks for the truly inspirational inscription.

Now, on to my thoughts about the book:

First, the physical aspects of the book itself. I never usually mention this unless the book if seriously oversize or noteably poorly made. This was neither, in fact, this is how ALL books should be made. All of them, forever. Well, all non-fiction ones at least.

I am not sure what this kind of binding is called, from the outside, it’s a glossy hardbound book and on the inside it’s a spiral binding. This is an awesome format. You get the quality of a hardback book (which, for the price, we can appreciate), but, it lies flat when open. OMG, I can’t tell you how cool that is.

The second nice physical feature is the recessed CD/DVD holder on the inside of the back cover. This is genius. I read a lot of tech books, many of them come with a CD of code and they are usually either in a paper sleeve glued to the back cover or bound in on a card stock page in the back. Neither of those is really satisfactory. Once you take out the CD to look at it, you can never put it back and expect it to stay. The little sleeve thing’s rip off tab is now gone. So, it’s a single use CD. Glenn’s book will forever keep its DVD (except when I am watching it) because there is a thoughtful and reusable place to keep it.

As to the DVD content, it’s nearly 90 minutes long. For an essentially free throw-in, that’s huge. And it’s well done. Seeing pictures of cabriolet legs being done is one thing, but after watching Glenn make one, I really believe I get it and can do it. It’s been a few weeks since I watched it, but I believe there are 5 sections to the DVD. All of the segments are well done and useful. On the PC side, there are a few PDF files of patterns and plans from the book.

As huge a step as this is, I think there ought to be more. The DVD ought to include a PDF of the full book including either full sized or known scale plans for all projects. You have a ton of space on a DVD, all of that had to be produced for the print edition anyway. So toss them in there. That way we can print out drawing and not have to expose the book to the shop for weeks.

Also, let’s not let what could be really valuable addition for woodworkers be hamstrung by ham-fisted attempts at copy protection. Use PDFs, they work well, the reader is ubiquitous. In this market, while there might be a few people that copy the files rather than buy the book, it’s not something real woodworkers would make a habit of. More likely, after persuing the file, they would buy a copy themselves. It’s what I would do. I work in two modes. If I am reading anything of length, I want paper. Drawings I want to manipulate and print out.

And, finally, the text itself. Glenn is still focused on a pretty high style. But, I am thinking I could make a few of these projects for two reasons. One, my skills are improving and opening up my range and, two, his text and photos really show the important parts of the project. He doesn’t waste a lot of space telling you how to measure this or cut that, instead he focuses on the setups and approaches needed to execute the step.

One thing that stands out in all of Glenn’s work is his *love* for dramatic grain pattern. The reason the rest of us don’t see much bird’s eye maple or tiger stripe is that he has it ALL. Every last bit of it and he makes every project out of this startling, dramatically figured wood. Almost to the point where, to me, the wood itself is distracting from the piece. To be sure, everything is well finished and it takes some skill to bring out these figured woods, but wow. Maybe it’s just that the period pieces are covered in 300 years of gunk, but I am more of a mahogany guy with understated wood figure.

I am not sure I will build anything in this book anytime soon. It’s still not the style my wife likes for the house and these projects are all too much work to make and give away. But, this book helped convince me that they are within my range if I do have an occasion to make them.

With both the physical aspects of the book/DVD and the well done projects, I give this 5 out of 5. I hope Glenn continues to produce these fine books and I look forward to getting some of his instructional DVDs now that I know the style suits me.… (mehr)