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| Craig Thibodeau in his studio |
Craig Thibodeau grew up around woodworking and enjoyed it as a hobby. He earned a degree in mechanical engineering and started a career in industrial product design. However, after his children were born, his hobby became a home-based vocation and his workshop became a professional studio.
A series of specialized courses
To intensify and deepen this transition he immersed himself in a series of specialized courses, such as:
- Advanced marquetry and veneering with Paul Shurch
- Hand applied finishes at the College of the Redwoods
- Traditional French Marquetry with Patrick Edwards
- Compound Bending with Brian Newell
This is part one of a two-part post
In this first part I'll focus on a few Ruhlmann-inspired Art Deco furniture pieces. I spoke with Craig after I made my last two posts: 'Rodney Black's Art Deco vision for Lady Christine IV interiors'; and 'Emile-Jacques Ruhlmann: genius of Art Deco' . Since I was planning to do a post on Craig's marquetry-enriched furniture designs, he suggested that I start with a few of his Art Deco tables and accessories.
As Silas Kopf pointed out in my last post:
"The man who has had the greatest influence on designer-craftsmen of furniture in the last 100 years is undoubtedly Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann"
One fine example of this is Craig Thibodeau's Art Deco Chess table
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Description from an article in Fine Woodworking
'Thibodeau, who won Best of Show last year (in San Diego's prestigious Design in Wood exhibition), gained inspiration for this Macassar ebony and holly chess table from Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann's Art Deco furniture. The playing surface, bubinga and holly parquetry squares, is framed with a Gabon ebony and holly inlay. A jatoba drawer is used for piece storage, and a slide-out tray with mother-of-pearl inlay and Gabon ebony runners holds pieces captured during play. The finish is Bright Rub conversion varnish and lacquer.'
From Fine Woodworking #201
Craig's comments regarding his design board
"I thought it would be worthwhile to illustrate my process for designing a piece of furniture. This particular piece is influenced primarily by 1920's and 1930's Ruhlmann Art Deco work and 17th and 18th century marquetry cabinets. The many details are brought together in an original piece faithful to the Art Deco style of the 20's and 30's", explained Craig. "This design board shows in detail the evolution of this piece from the initial cabinet design through to a smaller table design and is well documented in the 3-D models I use for all of my design work. Also visible are the key design details which are present in the initial design and follow through to the final design essentially unchanged. Each step in the evolution of this design is documented to demonstrate how a piece of my furniture changes through the process of refining a design."
A few more Ruhlmann inspired Art Deco tables and accessories
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Art Deco Table Lamp
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A marquetry table motif by Ruhlmann
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| Ruhlmann table with Deco inlay motifs |
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| Queen Elizabeth observing the Linley marquetry panel |
[The picture above is of Queen Elizabeth viewing the grand entry of the Queen Elizabeth during the ship's naming ceremony on October 11th, 2010. She is looking across at the marquetry panel that Cunard commissioned from her nephew David Linley's studio. Note that Her Majesty is standing next to a Ruhlmann derived circles motif. He used this as a marquetry decoration on a few pieces, including the table pictured above and several cabinets.] - kd
That's a very impressive chess table. I'm curious about the 3D-models described in the planning picture though. What technique was used to make them? And are they just for visualization, or actually use planning how all of the pieces will fit together like a blueprint?
ReplyDeleteThe 3-D models are created with Solidworks, a modeling software package I use when doing product design work. The 3-D models can be quickly transferred into 2-D drawings for use in the shop as construction drawings and also as templates for curved shapes. Sometime I do use the 3-D models as a sketch pad just to refine a shape but most often they do become usable drawings. Hope this helps.
ReplyDeleteCraig, thanks for your excellent answer to ndirksen's question.
ReplyDeleteI am so impressed by the good will of our 'community of practice' that I'll soon start a forum - I'll announce it in our 'News' section.
- kd
From archived post 'Gregg Novosad, Divine Design...'
ReplyDeleteAnother app is called 'SketchUp'. According to Gregg, who taught a class called 'SketchUp Primer' at the Marc Adams School of Woodworking earlier this year, "It is quickly becoming the defacto software standard for woodworkers".
- kd