Kesurokai

Cleaving a large oak log

Robin Wood has recently been cleaving a very large oak log which he is making into fence posts and rails. His current major project is building a footpath bridge in Bradfield, not far from where we live, and the fence will form the approach to the bridge.

The oak was felled in Sheffield's Eccleshall Woods for someone else's building project but it soon became clear that there were a lot of hidden nails in it; after excavating 6 or more they decided it was too likely to damage the sawmill. It seemed a shame to Robin that such a beautiful piece of wood might go to waste, so he decided to try working it with hand tools.

The cleaving process was started using metal wedges, then long, thin dry oak wedges which Robin carved himself, each pounded in with a large sledgehammer. Once in half, the two pieces (12' long and weighing about half a ton each) were split down and down, each time going into half so the split would run straight.

Robin's comment afterwards was that it was a very hard days work, but a joy to be able to make good use of such gorgeous material where power tools had failed!

Finally, a picture of the site showing where the first fence posts are going in. Robin has been hewing the surfaces with his Japanese carpenters ono (axe) and finds it a joy to do this work. There cannot be many examples of Japanese style hewing in the UK, though probably no one will ever notice.

 

More images and text on Robin's blog here and here.

Profile: Robin Wood

Robin Wood's craft skills are wide ranging. He is perhaps best known for is turning on a traditional foot-powered lathe and the book he wrote about the history of the craft The Wooden Bowl. We teach spoon carving courses together ... he's my husband in case you hadn't figured that out! He also uses traditional timber framing techniques to make bridges, stiles, gates, benches and other countryside furniture.

He is also passionate about preserving and promoting traditional skills and set up the Heritage Crafts Association as an advocacy body for traditional heritage crafts. Working in partnership with Government and key agencies, it provides a focus for craftspeople, groups, societies and guilds, as well as individuals who care about the loss of traditional crafts skills, and works towards a healthy and sustainable framework for the future.

His motivations for attending Kesurokai are twofold. Firstly, from a craft skills point of view he is keen to have the opportunity to work alongside and share skills with the other craftsmen, both European and Japanese. Secondly he is seeking inspiration for ways in which the Heritage Crafts Association might find new ways of passing skills from one generation to the next, a tradition the Japanese have held onto for longer than in the UK.

Full details about Robin here on his web site and here on his blog.

Profile: Cormac Seekings

Cormac Seekings' passion is the use of roundwood and minimally converted timbers in both framed and notched log carpentry.

Based in Scotland, he is one of the four UK attendees at this years' Kesurokai, inspired by the experience of working with the Japanese carpentry group at the 2007 torii gateway event. Afterwards he will be spending some weeks on a study tour of vernacular Minka. 

The tradition of Minka farmhouses is fertile ground for studying both framed and notched log carpentry, combined in a different way and with a very different perspective on both structure and joinery, from that in northern Europe.

Cormac believes that regional Minka, from cold and humid/cold parts of Japan, can inform aspects of a new vernacular of wooden craft-building in Scotland, and is keen to help develop this as part of his involvement with self-builder assistance and skill training for low impact buildings.

Pavilion plans

Plans for the European pavillion are moving ahead and I have been sent new drawings. Here are a couple of them showing the daisy wheel geometry and a German journeyman for scale:

I think the journeyman is standing next to a barbecue and there is some device for suspending something over the fire next to him. Next time I catch Hannes on Skype I will have to ask about that!

Our little barn

My first real experience of timber framing came in October 2008 when Kesurokai organiser Hannes Schnelle came to the UK with Michail Schütte to help Robin build a little barn next to our house for us to use as a log store / bicycle shed.

I had little understanding of what was happening and at first was perplexed. Every day I went into Sheffield to work because Hannes and Michail were living in my home-office. Every day when I returned there was still a large pile of timber in front of the house and no sign of any building! It was a while before I discovered that the frame is not built gradually, but every joint is cut, every part carefully assembled and disassembled, tried and tested, until everything is ready... THEN the whole frame is constructed in one go.

Here's a couple images from the big day and a video I made to record it:

and the finished barn full of logs and bicycles:

The European Pavilion

Here are the initial plans for the pavilion which the European group are going to lead with building. 

It will be made using daisy wheel geometry which it is believed was the traditional method used by medieval European carpenters. I am not going to try to explain it myself, but there is an article here (scroll to the bottom) which gives you the basics and I will ask one of the carpenters if they would write me a blog entry too!

Japanese tea house

The Japanese team have drawn up plans for the tea house they will build and also sent pictures of a scale model of the building: