Papa's Wood Shop: Simple Woodworking How-To and Project Plans for Beginners

Novice and beginning woodworkers find learning woodworking techniques well worth the effort and it’s fun but also time consuming. If you want to jump in quickly and start building functional projects for your home using simpler methods, Papa's Wood Shop Book 1 is for you. In this first book of the series there are four attractive and functional projects you can build using consumer brand tools you may already have. For each project there are photos, concise instructions, materials lists, drawings, and even exploded views to help with assembly. And future books in the series include a dozen more projects for home or office and much more. Read more about it below.

If you’re like me, your first question is “how can woodworking be simplified and why?’ The “why” is easy. To succeed as a one-person woodworking business for over 20 years you have to meet the needs of your customers with quality cabinets and furniture built promptly while making a profit. Over the years I developed many methods that made the job of building cabinets and furniture easier and faster while maintaining the quality that pleased my customers and increased profit for my woodworking business.

The “how” is not as easy. Simplifying is not about cutting corners or creating poor quality, not if you want to keep customers happy and coming back.

Each method you change to make things simpler has to be weighed against its impact on the overall quality, but it can be done.

And, it turns out these methods work even if you aren’t a professional. I used them to build projects in my home after retiring from the woodworking business. Now you can use them to build quality cabinets and furniture for yourself, family members and friends.

There are woodworkers who frown on some of these methods and even view some as shortcuts leading to poor quality. After serving hundreds of customers in Tampa, Florida and Austin, Texas, I know that’s not true. I never got calls about the quality of my work and most of my business was generated by word-of-mouth referrals.

Over the years I used traditional methods on some projects but as my business grew I simplified my methods, consistently maintaining high quality. The main objective of my simplified methods is to make building cabinets and furniture easier, faster, and safer. This doesn’t mean you stop honing your woodworking skills but to me the most important thing is to get a quality wood project completed. Your skills will improve as you build more projects, as is always the case with practice. If you feel the same way, this book and the series are for you.

Papa's Wood Shop Book 1 guides you through building four projects using low cost, consumer level power tools available at home improvement and department stores. I built every project in this book using these tools - and so can you! I share all the methods I learned in complete detail and also specific projects including photos, concise instructions, a materials list, drawings, and even exploded views. Everything you need to build the project yourself even with inexpensive, consumer brand tools.