To my simple mind, woodworking items are placed inside buildings built by carpenters. Of course that doesn't preclude a carpenter from being a woodworker, or vice versa.
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To my simple mind, woodworking items are placed inside buildings built by carpenters. Of course that doesn't preclude a carpenter from being a woodworker, or vice versa.
Rick Potter
DIY journeyman,
FWW wannabe.
AKA Village Idiot.
Member
If you want to see woodworking look at the post in off topic...Grand house for sale.....all woodworking. Every bit of it
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Types and occupations
A finish carpenter (North America), also called a joiner (a traditional name now rare in North America), is one who does finish carpentry, that is, cabinetry, furniture making, fine woodworking, model building, instrument making, parquetry, joinery, or other carpentry where exact joints and minimal margins of error are important. Some large-scale construction may be of an exactitude and artistry that it is classed as finish carpentry.
A carpenter and joiner is one who has a much broader skill ranging from joinery, finishing carpentry, building construction and form work.
A trim carpenter specializes in molding and trim, such as door and window casings, mantels, baseboards, and other types of ornamental work. Cabinet installers may also be referred to as trim carpenters.
A cabinetmaker is a carpenter who does fine and detailed work specializing in the making of cabinets made from wood, wardrobes, dressers, storage chests, and other furniture designed for storage.
A ship's carpenter specializes in shipbuilding, maintenance, repair techniques and carpentry specific to nautical needs in addition to many other on-board tasks; usually the term refers to a carpenter who has a post on a specific ship. Steel warships as well as wooden ones need ship's carpenters, especially for making emergency repairs in the case of battle or storm damage.
A shipwright builds wooden ships on land.
A cooper is someone who makes barrels: wooden staved vessels of a conical form, of greater length than breadth.
A scenic carpenter builds and dismantles temporary scenery and sets in film-making, television, and the theater.
A framer is a carpenter who builds the skeletal structure or wooden framework of buildings, most often in the platform framing method. Historically, balloon framing was used until the 1950s when fire safety concerns made platform framing inherently better. A carpenter who specializes in building with timbers rather than studs is known as a timber framer and does traditional timber framing with wooden joints, including mortise-and-tenon joinery, post and beam work with metal connectors, or pole building framing.
A luthier is someone who makes or repairs stringed instruments. The word luthier comes from the French word for lute, "luth".
A log builder builds structures of stacked, horizontal logs including houses, barns, churches, fortifications, and more.
A formwork carpenter creates the shuttering and falsework used in concrete construction.
In Japanese carpentry, daiku is the simple term for carpenter, a miya-daiku (temple carpenter) performs the work of both architect and builder of shrines and temples, and a sukiya-daiku works on teahouse construction and houses. Sashimono-shi build furniture and tateguya do interior finishing work.[20]
A restoration carpenter is a carpenter who works in historic building restoration, someone who restores a structure to a former state.
A conservation carpenter works in architectural conservation, known in the U.S. as a "preservation carpenter" who works in historic preservation, someone who keeps structures from changing.
Green carpentry is the specialization in the use of environmentally friendly,[21] energy-efficient[22] and sustainable[23] sources of building materials for use in construction projects. They also practice building methods that require using less material and material that has the same structural soundness.[24]
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Pretty much. If the product can be pretty easily moved and has pretty tight tolerances, it's woodworking.Originally Posted by Rick Potter
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You will find in this many trades that overlap and have become extinct.
I'm called a furniture maker by trade but as you can read I could be called many things on that list.
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Woodworking can be anything
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When I was attending trade school to obtain my cabinetmaker (also known as a joiner) certification, it was generally accepted that carpenters built structures, and cabinetmakers filled those structures up with "stuff". Both trades are (generally) "woodworkers" - although those carpenters who specialize in cement forming are an exception in my mind. The two trades intersect when it comes to finish carpentry - some finish carpenters are trades qualified carpenters, and others are trades qualified cabinetmakers (or joiners if you prefer).
Of course, I'm in Canada and I get the iimpression that our system of qualifying tradesmen is somewhat different than the system you have in the U.S.A. - so the above may not make sense to you.
I love mankind. It's people I can't stand.
To me woodworker or woodworking is an all inclusive term. Carpenters build houses (buildings) and do the wood portions of the construction, generally dealing with load bearing and support of structure which may include trim, built in cabinets etc.
Cabinet makers make furniture and cabinets which generally contain more detail and more intricate joinery than what a carpenter would ordinarily use.
There are also artists who create works of art using wood that are neither carpentry nor furniture.
With that said there are individuals with skills in either or all the camps and skill levels that go from extremely rough work to exceptionally fine work they are all still woodworkers.
Lee Schierer
USNA '71
Go Navy!
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Including members of Rich Riddle's club calling themselves Woodworker who probably only made salt and pepper shakers for family members. Anyway, when people ask me what I do, I never tell them I'm a woodworker. I tell them I'm a carpenter or cabinetmaker who specializes in moldings and millwork.
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I was a residential/commercial cabinet maker for 30yrs. On one hand i could count the amount of actual cabinet makers who could actually make "furniture" pieces. You will find a few cabinet makers on these forums that have broken this mold. There are so many so called cabinet makers out there who can build nothing but a box..
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We were just talking about this at work the other day. Cabinet guys generally can't do furniture, it ends up looking like cabinets. I know that holds true for me anyways. I'm definitely a cabinet maker, and I'm not capable of building much more than a box.
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I do some of what is considered Carpentry as part of my "real" job (I design, build and maintain radio stations). As a sideline, I do finish carpentry and build furniture, toys, boats and a lot of specialty technical cabinetry. I can't consider myself a carpenter, furniture maker or boat builder, as I have had no formal training in any of those areas. Everything I know has been either self taught, or watching/working alongside true professionals.
When anyone asks, I just refer to myself as "a monkey with a table saw". Simple response.
Bill R., somewhere in Maine
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I often wonder if this because of working with time constraints. I know it took me a while to get past the hurry hurry of making cabinets to slow down to get a better feel and understanding of furniture construction. At work i care about meeting a deadline on a piece but i can't rush a piece because of it. I would rather build it right the first time than explain poor construction...
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Originally Posted by Martin Wasner
We were just talking about this at work the other day. Cabinet guys generally can't do furniture, it ends up looking like cabinets. I know that holds true for me anyways. I'm definitely a cabinet maker, and I'm not capable of building much more than a box.
I don't know. I think it's just year after year of doing the same thing and not being able to make small changes to keep a piece of furniture from looking like a kitchen cabinet. The ability to think outside the box gets diminished after a while and you just get locked into doing the one thing that you do well.
Working at a high rate of speed doesn't necessarily mean you are sacrificing quality or craftsmanship. It just means that you know exactly what needs to be done, and how to do it.
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I showed this in another topic. I made this bed 10 years ago and was kinda my first adventure in getting away from typical cabinet design. But it really shows the cabinetry in its design. Looking at the second picture(not mine) you can see were you can go with a piece with a bit of patients and design. It takes desire to extend your skill level from square to round in a piece. You just gotta want it bad enough....
I really enjoy making poker tables and it got me away from cabinetry.
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