Handmade vs Perfection
Noah Bradley2019-06-29T10:20:44+00:00
The corner notching on this barn is beautiful, in part because it is flawed. It was built by a man who clearly understood the characteristics of wood and who was also highly skilled at using an axe. This barn was clearly not created by a man who built cabins for a living. The result? There are many flaws in the workmanship… gaps and irregularities abound. And yet, his work is absolutely gorgeous… because, it looks “handmade”.
There is a curse within all the building trades. It seems that the more a craftsman works on developing his skills, the more his work ends up looking manufactured. A stone mason shapes his stones so much they begin to look like brick. The brick mason’s work begins to look like rolled-out vinyl flooring. The plasterer’s work is so smooth that it looks like drywall. The blacksmith’s work becomes so free of character that it belongs on the shelf at Walmart.
There are many people that can do a sloppy job of notching a log cabin. I am fortunate to know a dozen or two that can do a perfect job at it, notches so tight that a dollar bill cannot be inserted anywhere between two logs. But there are precious few artisans who could reproduce this corner… something that “great, great, grandpa of old” whipped out when he wasn’t farming.
Originally posted 2015-09-07 14:05:52.
