Rough cut

Woodworking projects begin as an idea that works its way into a design, a design (if I’m on my game) that is fairly well formed before I ever go shopping for lumber. But at some point the design begs to be made, so off to the store I go.

Woodworkers generally don’t source their medium from the big box stores, but prefer to go to hardwood dealers. There are lots of reasons for this, but a some would be that hardwood dealers offer a wide variety of hardwood species that are both high quality and air dried.

The catch is that most wood available at these dealers comes rough cut, meaning it still bears the marks from the big blades that formed the lumber from the tree. Rough cut lumber might have a little bark still on it. Its edges aren’t often straight, adjoining faces won’t be square to each other, and opposite sides won’t be parallel. The thickness of these boards won’t be perfectly uniform along the length. There’s nothing smooth about rough cut wood.

Because it’s so rough, it’s usually hard to tell what the underlying grain patterns will look like before getting the wood home. Instead, I’ll try to look for the straightest pieces with the least obvious flaws, no cracks, and no voids.

Once the wood is sourced, thus begins the most cognitively dissonant phase of any woodworking project. Pieces of lumber, not attractive by any stretch and definitely not ready to be used (yet), clutter my shop while the image of the finished piece lives fully formed in my mind. The rough cut lumber and the image bear no resemblance to each other. In this state, I can’t be sure which particular board will make up any given part of the finished piece. It’s only because I’ve done this before that I know that one thing will turn into the other.

It’s a faith thing at this point.