What's The Best Wood Working Magazine?

[Julie Moriarty]

Just curious what the favorites are in woodworking magazines...

This is what I know of. Their annual price and number of issues are included:

American Woodworker - $20/6

Fine Woodworking - $35/7

Popular Woodworking - $25/7

Wood Magazine - $28/7

Woodworker & Woodturner - $91/13

Woodworkers Journal - $20/6

Woodcraft - $20/6

Good Woodworking - $91/13

I tried to create a poll but a database error prevented it.

[David Weaver]

None of them. I have taken PWW, FWW and the WC magazine (which was free when I got it). I never got much out of any of them and think the price of them is better spent toward something I need.

I liked PWW the best of them (and may still be getting it, I can't remember), because it seemed like they were trying to offer what people wanted. FWW's correspondence is arrogant and borderline offensive in my opinion, especially their attempts to get you to renew subscriptions.

[Keith Outten]

This link will provide a huge list of threads concerning favorite magazines.

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/search.php?searchid=1233352

IMO the best investment for woodworking information is SawMill Creek at just 50 cents per month for 24/7 access to information that grows every hour of every day, unlimited classified advertisements that produce results, access to our FreeStuff Drawings with a chance to join the list of 224 winners who have received over $40,000.00 in prizes, etc, etc.
.

[Peter Quinn]

None of them. I have taken PWW, FWW and the WC magazine (which was free when I got it). I never got much out of any of them and think the price of them is better spent toward something I need.

I liked PWW the best of them (and may still be getting it, I can't remember), because it seemed like they were trying to offer what people wanted. FWW's correspondence is arrogant and borderline offensive in my opinion, especially their attempts to get you to renew subscriptions.

Agred. I'm taking a break from FWW for a while, I let the subscription lapse, they pummel me with emails trying to get me to come back. I'm not quitting wood working as their emails would suggest, I'm just giving them a break. Some months were great, others I could skip most or all of the content. Lots of recycling, occasionally a whole month of rudiments for newbies, I know they are trying to attract new wood workers, and have an online subsection focused on that. But it's like public school trying to balance class rooms by putting the brightest kids in a room with the slowest....it only services half the audience. No child left behind....but some shackled to those that move slower? Well that's how it got to feel, but unlike public school, I pay for the pleasure, and when better than 40% of what I saw was recycled or basic, the pleasure is all theirs.

[Jim Tabor]

FWW cost to much. I enjoyed Popular Woodworking a few years ago when they had articles by Kerry Pierce and other Shaker projects. Now their down to what...65-70 pages? American Woodworker has turned into a small crafts magazine. In the last couple of issues most of them have felt the need to have a blanket chest project....again. And one of then had a Morris chair.....again. With that said, I still subscribe to five of them. Maybe a shaker project in the next issue?

[Dave Kirby]

I wouldn't subscribe to any of them. If I see an issue that has something of interest or value, I'll pick it up. I have subscribed to many in the past and found that I might get one or two issues that have something useful and the rest I just wasted my money on. I'd rather not get locked in to one magazine and certainly can find better things to spend all the money I'd use to subscribe to them all. Just my two cents.

[John Schweikert]

Discussed earlier this year: http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthre...rking+magazine

[Frederick Skelly]

Hi Julie.
I buy Wood and FWW. My skills are at a journeyman level for power tools and I'm an utter newbie with hand tools (less than a year of experience there.)

Wood's recycling a lot too. But I like it for project ideas. I'm going to stop buying FWW because the articles just don't give me enough to actually learn from - for me its rather "poof, and now we're done". I avoid TV woodworkers for the same reason. But that may be unique to just me.

I'll go out on a limb here and speculate that the more skilled one is, the less they'll get out of most WW mags. To me, most seem targetted to a beginner-to-journeyman audience. (Not sure why - maybe they buy more of the kinds/brands of tools that advertize in WW mags?) If that's true, a hyper-skilled person couldn't get their money's worth out of most subscriptions.

My $0.02 anyway.
Fred

[David Peterson]

There's more education at SMC than any magazine or book could ever offer. I had an online subscription with FWW for a few years and realized later on that I never, ever used it. Unlike any publication, the support and advice on offer here can be specific and immediate to whatever help I need on anything related to my woodworking.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

Julie, FWW still gets my vote, BUT.... Not the new ones. I look through my archives pretty often for some idea that was well addressed in years past. They were really good for quite a while.

I agree with Keith though, paper mags are really loosing their place as the top purveyor of woodworking knowledge to mediums such as Sawmill Creek.

[Dick Brown]

Interesting opinions. I used to take a number of WW mags, tired of what seemed to be same info in just different clothes and quit them all. Was at a yard sale a week ago and bought 130 issues in 2 boxes of older FWW, Wood, PWW, etc. They looked about the same and with about the same articles as the current ones other than the tools in the ad's were from 20 years ago. Can't believe there is nothing new and they have said all there is to say about woodworking??? I agree with other posts that as we grow in our experience we start thinking for ourselves, become more creative, form our own style, and depend less on others ideas.

[Greg Peterson]

I don't know which magazine is best as it really depends on your needs/wants.

I've built a couple of projects from Wood magazine and a found few others I would like to build. I like FWW, but like most of the magazines, find the cost higher than what I am willing to pay on a regular basis.

If I come across an issue of any magazine that appeals to me I'll pick it up. Like most I suspect, I often find myself digging through a pile of magazines trying to find a project or review, and this thought seems to be ever more prescient as I thumb through a magazine rack. I keep telling myself I need to throw together a database, but that idea quickly goes out of my head because I then find the issue I am searching for.

[Ralph Boumenot]

I think you should look at Woodsmith and Shop Notes too. Both of them are good magazines.
What are you looking for in a magazine? Each of them delivers a different flavor in my opinion.

[Loren Woirhaye]

They fit different market niches. I think FWW is the most interesting because the featured work is often to professional (marketable) standards aesthetically speaking. So if you want to sell work and make something like a living at it, FWW is a good choice. I don't see any problem with reading back issue articles though and you can buy a DVD with like 30 years of them for less than $100. I haven't subscribed in years.

Some of the magazines focus on reviewing the new tools, which advertisers like, and shop-made jigs and tools, which people trying to improve their skills and shop capacities on a hobby budget enjoy.

I don't subscribe to any technique magazines anymore. The content becomes repetitive.

[larry senen]

fine woodworking has the pics and the production values, but i gave up on it many, many years ago when the topic of discussion was, why are carvers mallets cylindrical ? the consensus was, so when you missed the chisel you wouldn't hurt your hand too much.