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To live and enjoy every day to its fullest, use my gifts to help others, I travel to wherever passion finds me.

What Will She Paint?

So many friends I met here...!

Sunday, September 13, 2009

MY FAVORITE OAK PIECE

Loved the many reactions to the 9 foot painting easel hubby made and decided to tell you how it's made. He wants to stay anonymous, so I wiped his face out of the pics.

In Holland one cannot find work as a carpenter unless one finished trade school.This carpenter comes from a carpenter's family. His father was a carpenter, and also hubby's younger brother.

This means that he is not only very skilled with wood,
but also thinks in terms of solutions, and is interested how parts are put together (like a mechanic).

We were in an art warehouse once and looked at the different mechanisms in easels.
*I needed one that could hold big paintings, and
*an easel that could be transported easily, since I regularly paint somewhere else at painting events.

The main parts are :
the oblong base on rollers, because I wouldn't want to lift this baby, LOL
An oblong frame in the front
that holds the two 9 foot tall sliding posts
Two supporting posts in the back that hold the front of the easel in place
the sliding contraption.



Then comes the question: what comes where? All these pieces just look planks of wood to me!
Since I'm not a carpenter, I gave him a little interview.

What was the most time consuming and intricate part in building this easel?
To make it slide up and down well.

How did you do that?
The tong and groove on the side of the 2 tallest vertical supports makes it slide for different sizes of canvas

The shelf to hold paintings supplies can also be adjusted, right?
The shelf can be winched because of the tong and groove inside of the two outside vertical posts.

And the angle of the biggest posts can be adjusted as well (that's important for me because larger canvases need to stand more straight, so I can reach it with my arms)


Here he has a look of how well the wood is stained. In my layman's observations that seems to be very important for carpenters. Now can your hubby or friend build you an easel like this?
Hope I didn't go too technical on you:) My explanation was longer, but when I read it to hubby, he said it sounded confusing.


Voila, the end result. This oak easel will last longer than my generation!
My kids joked, "if dad makes it, it will hold up for 300 years", when some of his colleaques complained that when the owners changed their mind about their kitchen, it took the workers a long time to take apart what hubby had built before.

22 comments:

Dimple said...

The easel itself is a work of art. Thanks for sharing how it was made. I'm not a carpenter, and verbal descriptions of physical things don't convey much to me, but pieces going together to make a whole I understand!

Gaelyn said...

How nice to have a real carpenter handy. The finished product is a beautiful piece of furniture and appears to be versitile for your large paintings.

SAPhotographs (Joan) said...

This is a fantastic piece of art and workmanship on its own Jeannette. Please can I send my list of things I want your hubby to make. Better still, send him here for a couple of months.I will feed him well and you can come along too.LOL!!

This is one of those things you can pass down for generations. I hope some of the grandkids turn out to be as talented as you.

Jeannette StG said...

Dimple,
Yes, I think it's real craftmanship!
Glad you could follow the description!

Jeannette StG said...

Gaelyn,
Yes, very handy, since I'm not LOL
Because this easel can do everything I need, I'm set for life!

Jeannette StG said...

Joan,
You don't know this, but this has already actually happened! - not for a couple of months though -I think it was 3 weeks.
Grand kids are still too young to tell if one of them is determined enough to keep developing their talent:)

Mirage said...

MAde with love!

I admire your paintings...it has always been a dream of mine... :D

keep it up!

SAPhotographs (Joan) said...

LOL!! Maybe you should start a Hubby-for-rent business. :) Naturally you will keep all the profits from his work. LOL!! Don't show him what I said, he will most likely want to kill me for the suggestion. LOL!!

Jeannette StG said...

Mirage,
Yes, love x 2: for me and for the craft! Do you mean that it has always been a dream for you to have an easel, or a dream to paint?

Jeannette StG said...

Such a good idea, Joan! I think he'll have "a little talk" instead, which is worse than kill you!!
Are you crazy -how can I keep the profits hidden from him?? Open a Swiss bank account?
Glad you have not lost your humor yet:)

Floss said...

What an amazing piece! Thanks for sharing it with us - it's good to see what goes into making something so special.

DUTA said...

I looked at the enlarged photo and got very impressed by the finished product.

I was asked once what is the first thing that I notice in men. I said: his hands. I don't know why. Perhaps because it is with his hands that he hugs his woman and... it is with his hands that he makes and fixes things for her in the house.

crochet lady said...

You have a talented guy there.

Jeannette StG said...

Floss,
When they talk about oak, it's mostly something old, but I am glad this is a new oak piece:)
Hope you had a a good kids birthday party (and are stil alive!)?

Jeannette StG said...

Duta,
I think I had the right first impression about you - you are a very sensitive person. I would like to add to what you said, hands and a kind heart.

Jeannette StG said...

Jen,
may be good that I finally realize now how talented he is. In my younger years I might have taken it more for granted.

Irene said...

You have a very smart husband. He thought of all the potential problems and found a solution for them. All men should be that handy. Does he do this for a living?

Jeannette StG said...

Yes, he is smart. Do you mean making easels for a living? No, he made this one for me, because we couldn't find an easel that was for big paintings AND easy to transport, but now you say it, that would be an idea!!

Diane AZ said...

Beautiful easel and talented husband! Interesting learn about how it was made. It must be a joy to use your big, well-made easel.

Jeannette StG said...

Diane,
Thank you, Diane - yes, I feel like a fish in water when painting on this easel - I like big and I like that there's place for the tubes of paint, brushes, and I don't need an extra table for that.

Rosie said...

Your huge painting easel is a thing of beauty and will last for years. How creative you both are:)

Jeannette StG said...

Rosie,
Yes, this easel will outlast me (I don't know if that is good grammar:) )! The first two decades I really had no clue what hubby could do with wood (because I had never seen his work). After he went back into carpentry in the USA to pay my graduate school bills, I am glad that I finally got an idea about his craftsmanship. But it was only later that I discovered his knack for finding solutions. Never too late LOL