The end of childhood

Well, now I've done it. For an inexperienced woodworker and art aficianado, I have some serious opinions about design. And yet I've read little of a truly serious bent on the subject. Aside from reading a few of George R. Walker's blog postings and a few articles in Fine Woodworking and other such magazines, I really haven't studied furniture design much. I suppose my thoughts have been more of an, "I know what I like" simplicity. I view this as both a strength and a weakness. 

But now I've ordered "By Hand & Eye" from Lost Art Press, George Walker's and James Tolpin's treatise on furniture design.  Before I read it, though, I feel that I should capture some of my own naive thougts about the topic. I'm hoping that the way that my opinion changes between now and then might be illuminating to me (and perhaps others) on the evolution of design sophistication.

The design thought I've had today is that, for the modern woodworker who builds furniture, the word 'design' has a pretty specific meaning. The meaning is really in three parts, two of which are often glossed over. Part 1 is, 'what type of traditional furniture piece should I build?' The answer to this is usually one of these X options: a dining table, a chair, a cabinet, a side table, a desk, a storage box, or a bookshelf.   Part 2 is usually, 'in what style should I build it?' What period should I emulate? Shaker? Arts and Crafts? "Period"? or for the more adventurous . . . Art Nouveau. There are actually about 30 different options in this part.

And the third major design option now considered is the one that I suspect Mr.s Walker and Tolpin are largely concerned with, which is the overall shape and dimensions of the piece. If building a bookshelf, should it be low and squat or tall and thin, or somewhere in the middle? Golden ratio, or some other classical order? Or defined by the materials on hand? 

That's it. That defines modern furniture style for the custom and amateur woodworking world today. And I feel as if this misses much of the richness of what furniture design could be.  (Boy, that's an audacious claim, isn't it? I may even be able to justify that statement, in an upcoming posting.)