The Workbench Design Book: The Art & Philosophy of Building Better Benches

I recently received a couple of instructional books. Without a doubt this was the last one that I picked up. The printing was bland, the paper was of moderate quality (at best) and the images are all in black and white. From all outward appearances, I thought that I’d purchased a dud. You know the old saying, “don’t judge a book by it’s cover”. In my experiences, this was never more true. After finishing those other high-gloss, academically tedious books, I was bored senseless and reluctant to begin reading. I’m happy to report though, this was the most well-written, engaging and informative book in the stack. Schwarz has a “just the facts, mam” style peppered with honest self-criticism that almost demands your trust. His narrative is from the heart and with the kind of experience that doesn’t impose itself, but rather asks you to take your own situations into account. He’s funny too, and I appreciate a bit of off-topic humor to make a point. The benches included in the plans try to accommodate all situations: budget, time, flexibility, etc. each chapter has an evaluation of his take on the plans as well. It’s everything that I was looking for and more. To be completely transparent, I’ve not yet started any of the plans but I’m looking forward to doing so. I really enjoyed the read - it was like having a conversation with an experienced friend.

Great book and Chris Schwarz-isms humor throughout. This is the 2nd workbench book. I have both. This has some review of book one, but a lot more designs. There were only basically 2 benches in the first book; 8 in the second. This has a chapter on updating your bench. For me, there was more theory in the first book and I read that a couple of times. But then as I'm working on the design for my bench, I am spending much more time in this book. I would guess I will spend more time with this book than with the first, but I consider buying both even though there is overlap. I wonder if my local library was better equipped if I would have just borrowed the books. I think once I'm finished my bench, I may not use these books again. Consider the Fine Woodworking Best Workbenches book as well. It has many design ideas that may compliment the ones in this book; particularly the Garrett Hack bench and the Essential Workbench. There's good detail in that book for making the breadboard ends. I think too much emphasis is placed on the wooden screw vices. I'm very happy with my purchase. If I could choose only this one or the first one, I would choose this one.

Schwarz provides detailed analyses of the features needed for a good workbench, and evaluates a wide range of designs and how well they meet those goals. This allows the reader to evaluate their particular needs; identify the features critical them; and assess design options to best meet them. This volume is a companion to his From Design & Theory to Construction & Use book, focusing more on practical examples than that more theoretical volume. The set of designs included covers a wider range of designs and options which complement the couple included in his From Design & Theory... book. Between the two, they cover most popular options. The designs included could be built as-is, but to best meet your needs, you will likely mix and match features among the various types. The only flaw I find, is that Chris concludes in many cases that the best choice is heavier, thicker wood assembled with more precise joinery, rather than taking more advantage of structural design approaches, like cross bracing - but I acknowledge that he's built and used benches a lot more that I.

Bought this book, and The Workbench:, A complete Guide to Creating Your Perfect Bench. Was sucked in by the amazing photography of The Workbench. For this book, it was the high praise for this book and it's author, from Mark, Matt and Shannon of the WookTalk podcasts. While the color photography of the other book is stunning, the detailed line drawings and b/w photos of this book, combined with Christopher Schwarz's detailed guidance on what not to build and why, are humorous, rational and very instructive. Having read it now, cover to cover, twice, I have a clearer idea what I want, and what I don't need in a proper bench. Thank you, Mr. Schwarz.

I'm planning to build a bench for my home shop. The choices are overwhelming, when it comes to design, material and hardware. This book hasn't eliminated all of the decision frustration, but it's gone a long way by giving me a lot of practical advice from experience. Most (not all) of the plans have a materials list, which helps. While reading, I had some questions that were broached, but not covered as deeply as I was hoping for. I haven't read any other workbench books, so I can't compare, but I can say that I love this book and have spent many hours reading and reviewing it over the past month while I try to figure out what the heck I'm going to build. As mentioned, I really like Chris' writing style. I've seen him on The Wood-wright's Shop and he's entertaining and very knowledgeable. His book was just as entertaining, I found. I definitely recommend it.

This book, a followup to Christopher Schwarz' earlier manifesto( Workbenches: From Design And Theory To Construction And Use (Popular Woodworking) ), contains a lot more of his options and ideas about workbench design and construction. It also contains detailed photographs, measured drawings, and step-by step directions for building nine different benches. But Schwarz doesn't want you to build these benches- at least, he doesn't want you to build them exactly as he presents them. Instead, he wants you to design your own bench, based on the way you like to work. Want to build an 18th Century Roubou workbench using 21st Century hardware and LVLs? That's cool with Schwarz, so long as it works for you. There's a lot more in this book that you can easily digest in one reading. I've been making sketches and rereading various chapters since it arrived, making plans for the bench that will replace my lightweight Sjoberg. Right now it looks like a commercial laminated top on tenon-joined 4x4s with a mix of hardware, but it's not done yet. If you do hand work, or a mix of hand and power tool work, and the commercial benches you've tried or looked at don't seem to make your work any easier than using a door and a couple of sawhorses, check out this book.

Kudos to Chris Schwarz et al. for revisiting the first book and creating this exceptionally well-written and researched collection of work! ~ Hundreds of photos detailing key fabricating and assembly processes ~ Nine plans that are also available in Google SketchUp format ~ Numerous practical thoughts and interesting philosophies to guide you to build a great customized bench ~ Chapter devoted to work holding hardware, (but does not discuss the brilliant BenchCrafted Criscross) ~ Entire chapter of drawings on bench designs that an intermediate woodworker could easily build from ~ Nice section on building a wall hung tool rack ~ Chris's challenge: Chapter Seventeen, The Best Bench Never Built If you are up to the task of creating a bench to last a lifetime, you'll love this book. Nick D. Benson Operations Manager National Center for Craftsmanship Fort Collins, CO

This is a collection of 9 articles and plans on woodworking benches published by the woodcraft magazine Popular Woodworking - they must be from the '90's and early 2000's. There are accompanying chapters on various aspects of organizing and crafting solutions for issues related to bench-work, design and storage. The collection is co-edited by Christopher Schwarz, but most of the plans and articles are not by him - and much of the commentary is not his either. It was published about a year before he broke out with "The Anarchist's Tool Chest", so where Schwarz does show up in this collection feels headed in the direction of that remarkable work, but it's not there yet. The plans offer a variety of approaches to solutions for different kinds of work, budgets, and circumstances (knock-down/portable, massively heavy, ready for power- tools). This book is sometimes interesting and insightful, and sometimes it also seems like a tour of a random editorial yard-sale. Schwarz suggests that this is a book for someone who wants to design their own bench from the ground up, mixing and matching solutions and ideas from the variety of plans. That may be - it's an appealing idea - but I'm not really equipped to evaluate that claim - I simply don't have enough experience. My guess is it's a clever editorial gimmick - a bit of smoke a mirrors to try to get away with repackaging old material because the collection of plans feels random - not aligned with his ideas - and the content seems constrained and limited - as you might expect from an effort by corporate publishing. I was drawn to the book becasue I was already a fan of Schwarz's later work - but after reading his "Anarchist's Tool Chest" this definitely left me underwhelmed. I believe it was also around this time that he quit his job at the magazine and struck out on his own - so this might represent one of his last editorial escapades. It's not terrible, just not especially coherent or brilliant. As a side note - in 2020 Christopher Schwarz released an early draft of his third book in the Anarchist series: "The Anarchist's Workbench" for free - no strings attached - you can still do a search for it and find his blog post about it and download the pdf easily - Amazon won't allow me to incude the link. If you want an in-depth discussion of workbenches, craftsmanship, materials, and tools that is both practical and philosophical - from a guy who has lived and breathed this craft for decades - it is worth checking out. Who knows - you might find that totally annoying and this one might be exactly what you were looking for! I didn't have any issues with the quality of the printed text I received - it was solid - but the kindle version is still atrocious.