Henry O. Studley Workbench

Or read this in Russian

I haven’t posted anything here for a while, and there were some good reasons to it. Somewhere in my previous posts I wrote that I got an invitation to Miniature Masterworks Show in KC. There were also a competition announced, Barbara Marshall award. It wasn’t allowed to show the piece you were making for the award, so my silence can be easily explained now, lol. There was a lot of work, especially two last months were terrible.
So here is the piece I was making, a workbench.

Why Workbench? It was my second one, the first was Roubo workbench that I showed about a year ago, maybe more. I showed it on IGMA forum, and many people liked it, Bill Robertson suggested I should try making Henry O. Studley workbench. For those who haven’t seen his work, he was famous for his toolchest.

Bill wants to make it in miniature, but a bit bigger than 1/12. When I heard his suggestion I thought that it was a bit too much, there weren’t many photos on Google search but it was enough to see:)
But it got into my head, so when I heard about the competition I immediately thought of it. I knew that a lot of artisans would choose something French, Rococo etc (and I was right, hehe). I wanted something different and couldn’t think of anything, but this workbench somehow stuck in my head, so I decided to make it.
From one hand, it wasn’t a good choice, not many people would appreciate it, only those, I think, who work with wood or metal. On the other hand, it was very honest project, something where every artisan’s work begins. So the decision was made.
I bought a book about Studley’s bench to decide on proportions and dimensions.
The process was not comfortable for me, I don’t like metalwork, to be honest, so the whole thing was a challenge and such an out of comfort zone project, that I think there’s no piece I can’t make, lol.
I didn’t take any prize, but heard a lot of nice words about the workbench, and it has found its place in a museum.
I really enjoyed the show, all the staff and visitors were so friendly, I didn’t see such a vibe in Kensington, to be honest.
I’ll be attending Guild School in June,2018. So there’s something to look forward to.

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