Suggestions for books on furniture design?

[WillAdams]

My son wants to design a break-down dining table for his tiny Manhattan apartment --- anyone have suggestions on books which would advise this as a design effort? Ideally it will be something which will last him for multiple years, and apartments.

 

[bcrawley]

There is a folding gateleg dining table in the October 2017 issue of Popular Woodworking. Looks like you can buy and download the issue on their site. A former editor told me she prefers it with a gateleg on only one side; but you could do it either way. I remember it thinking I might make one for my kids one day. You might find other plans for gateleg tables in books and magazines out there.

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[bcrawley]

In 2016 my ex's parents wanted to join us at Thanksgiving, so I made a folding extension to my small dining table. I figured out how to make the folding legs from the book Campaign Furniture by Lost Art Press. It isn't exactly to a plan in the book, as the scale and height were to match the existing table. But the book provides the essential idea; and one could rescale such a table as I did (up to a point).

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[4nthony]

I don't have any book suggestions, but there's a YouTube channel that is focused on tiny space living:
https://www.youtube.com/@nevertoosmall/videos

Some of the videos have very creative furniture designs and I'm always watching for inspiration.

 

[woodbutcherbower]

To add to 4nthony’s post above - there’s a hugely successful TV series in the UK called ‘George Clarke’s Amazing Spaces’ which is currently in its 11th season. It’s all about folks making the most of tiny spaces to live in and features some brilliant ideas. A lot of them are on YouTube;
=ygUcYW1hemluZyBzcGFjZXMgZ2VvcmdlIGNsYXJrZQ%3D%3D

If you get a ‘not available in your country’ message - use a VPN.

 

[bobtskutter]

A well known Swedish furniture store has many items which fold down or can be taken apart.  You used to be able to download the assembly instructions.... [wink]

regards
bob

 

[mino]

A well known Swedish furniture store has many items which fold down or can be taken apart.  You used to be able to download the assembly instructions.... [wink]

regards
bob

And most of those are utter *expletives removed*.

The "problem" with their stuff that is outside "bog standard" stuff made to cost they design for ease of manufacturing (aka cost) at minimal usability. Rarely do they put usability (or even looks) first. This results in most of their designs having a great price/value ratio courtesy of a low price, not of high value. Great for temporary setup for a young family short on cash. But really nothing more.

I.e. their designs, while often inovative, shoot for the exact opposite of the spectrum one looks at when making custom furniture.

My 2c.

 

[Packard]

Note:  I see that BCrawley suggested this same design.  This is an expansion on that design.

A gate-leg table is exceptionally versatile.  It can be a 12” wide sideboard, a 3-sided breakfast table (seating 3) or a 4-sided dining table seating 6.

This Ikea design is shown because it displays well the versatility of the design.  I’m sure you can find plans somewhere online.

I made mine with casters on the center stack.  The gate legs did not have casters and added to the stability. 


This guy built his using pocket hole joinery, but I would prefer dowels or dominoes for construction.  I built one many years ago with dowels and butt joints only and with an edge banded plywood top. 

 

[cider]

I like Joyce’s Encyclopedia of Furniture Making.  No plans, but it is a compendium of construction methods and advice so you can design your own stuff. So much more than “this is a dovetail, and this is a mortise/tenon”.

 

[WillAdams]

Joyce’s Encyclopedia of Furniture Making.

Thanks! Found a hardcover on Amazon for not too much, so purchased that for him.

Campaign Furniture by Lost Art Press

Is it filled with typos as the book Virtuoso is (was?)? (has that ever had a corrected reprinting?) Guess I should have mentioned that I wanted the book to be something which wouldn't make me angry or offend my sensibilities.

I also bought him:

Traditional Korean Furniture Hardcover by Man Sill Pai and Edward Reynolds Wright

I've actually had a gate leg table for decades, and have offered it, but he wants something sturdier/nicer.

 

[bcrawley]

Well I don't know you so of course I don't know what offends you or makes you angry. If your son isn't into a gateleg design-- those have been around for centuries, so there must be tons of plans (there is a high style one in some posts on Jack Plane's blog, but with little help to follow along)-- I don't know what exactly he's looking for. Another thought is a thing I've seen under various names; used in taverns, boats, and monasteries I think, a bench whose back folds down into a table. A colonial item here probably coming from Europe.

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I could figure that out from the photo but I don't know what your son's experience is. Another idea is a knock-down trestle table-- one design comes with a Wood Whisperer series, so lots of guidance there.

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I was just at a friend's tiny NY apartment for a party Weds night. Their couch was their fold-out bed. I think you could knock down a table like that for a move, or a party, but doubt you'd want to do it every day. The tenons will suffer from dings and furrows. Campaign furniture isn't written much about; the book has all the info your son would need, depending on the style he wants. LAP would be the source of info on reprints. They are a small, ethical outfit, and reprint according to buyer interest (and writer contract). I've never read any book without typos. Maybe they are more than usual in the Studley book. But were it not for their Studley book, we wouldn't have all those photos; that's what I picked it up for!

 

[Packard]

I have two books that I have read cover to cover (shown below).  Much of it seemed “old fashioned when I read it in 1995? And in 2000 or so.  One was originally published in 1970, so no mention of dominoes, pocket hole jigs or self-centering dowel fixtures.

The other was from 1992, but still old.

But both had excellent illustrations.

I have another book, which I won’t share because of some of the dangerous suggestions they included.  It was written by the editor of one of the magazines of that time.  (He suggested mounting two rip blades with a spacer between, to enable you to rip two pieces at one time.  It seemed like a good idea to me until I understood about kick back.)

I also have a much older book—I did not find it when I looked, but I will look again.  From that book, I actual implemented a technique. 

I had built a flat file with a maximum of 44” x 44” prints.  Each drawer had sides of just 2”.  The problem was that the sides would bow out and the plywood set in grooves would fall down. 

The suggestion was to take a 2” x 1/2” board that was long enough to span the width of the drawer (outside dimensions).  To cut a dovetail , and a dovetail opening midpoint on the drawer and glue it in on the underside of the drawers.

I did the first drawer that way (it worked fine, but took me a long time to execute).  For the rest of the drawers I simply notched the drawer sides (underneath) and attached the spanning 2” strip using 1/4” dowels (that worked fine too—but less elegant).

If I can find it, I will show it too.

I will part with either or both books to anyone who promises to reimburse me for postage.  (USA, only).  (I will enforce payment by threats of embarrassing public posts—so I am sure I will be paid.) [big grin]

I was enchanted by both books when I first read them.  Most of the techniques seem cumbersome by contemporary standards, so I don’t know how useful they are.

 

[WillAdams]

I've never read any book without typos. Maybe they are more than usual in the Studley book. But were it not for their Studley book, we wouldn't have all those photos; that's what I picked it up for!

Dr. Donald Knuth has a standing offer --- if you find a typo in one of his books, he'll cut you a check for a hexadecimal dollar (I have one such for his Digital Typography).

For the LAP book I mentioned, there's a photo which is missing --- the photo of the flat pliers were repeated where there should have been a detail photo of the pair of two jewelry pliers, and quite a few other typos --- H.O. Studley's name is mis-spelled on the inside front cover, and the index is missing many entries, and in addition to not pointing out that italics indicate that an entry is for a photograph, they used a typeface where it is not terribly distinguishable between roman and italic.

 

[ChuckM]

Typos and grammatical errors do not upset me, but they're unnecessary distractions. The DF500 manual has some typos that should've been easy to spot and edit.

 

[Packard]

I found this error in Nelson Demille’s “Plum Island”.

He wrote, “I put on my galvanized rubber boots”.

I wrote, “Perhaps “vulcanized” boots would be more comfortable.

He wrote back that “everyone except you missed it.  It will be corrected for future reprints.”  I still have the letter in my desk.  It is pretty easy to overlook even egregious errors when proofreading.

 

[PaulMarcel]

He wrote back that “everyone except you missed it.  It will be corrected for future reprints.”  I still have the letter in my desk.  It is pretty easy to overlook even egregious errors when proofreading.

I think our brains correct many things without noticing. All those "find the mistake" posts demonstrate this pretty well: read them and you won't notice anything until you go back almost parsing mechanically to find duplicated words or missing words

 

[Usheenayer]

For books, I’d recommend checking out The Complete Manual of Woodworking by Albert Jackson and The Furniture Bible by Christophe Pourny. Both give solid advice on design, materials, and durability. If he's into something a little more modern, using AI  furniture design tools (like those from SilkPLM) might be a cool option to help him create a practical, stylish table that can break down easily but still look great over the years. I recently used some AI-assisted design tools myself, and it really opened up new possibilities without compromising quality.

 

[smorgasbord]

Dr. Donald Knuth has a standing offer --- if you find a typo in one of his books, he'll cut you a check for a hexadecimal dollar (I have one such for his Digital Typography).

That's so cool - a fellow nerd!

In case others are wondering what a "hexadecimal dollar" is and what this is all about:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knuth_reward_check

As of October 2001, Knuth reported having written more than 2,000 checks, with an average value exceeding $8 per check. By March 2005, the total value of the checks signed by Knuth was over $20,000. Very few of these checks were actually cashed, even the largest ones. More often they have been framed and kept as "bragging rights".

But, coding errors - that where the big money lies (lay?).