Free woodworking tutorials

The non-profit Center for Furniture Craftsmanship in Rockport, Maine has launched a free online library of best practices in woodworking at www.woodschool.org/videolibrary.

“Welcome to Woodschool” is a series of 50 professionally filmed, instructional videos that feature best-practice techniques from the center’s professional-track curricula, presented by lead instructor Tim Rousseau. Topics range from tool sharpening and hand-cut dovetails to five different ways of machine-cutting tenons, to building forms and laminating curves.

“Filming these videos gave us a way to share the incredible depth of knowledge that hundreds of outstanding woodworkers from around the globe have contributed to our curricula through teaching,” Peter Korn, the center’s founder and executive director, said in a statement. “Making this knowledge accessible to the world at large, regardless of financial, geographic, or cultural barriers, goes right to the heart of our mission as a nonprofit school.”

The videos were filmed in the spring and summer of 2020, while classes were suspended due to the pandemic. They were instrumental to the safe reopening of the center in September 2020, as they allowed students to maintain social distancing while watching demonstrations that require close-up viewing.

The center hopes to expand the free library in future years with additional instructors and topics. 

This article was originally published in the August 2021 issue.