Woodcraft is the process of building, carving or fashioning objects from wood, it is the skills involved in turning wood into shelter and functional furniture. Although the ability to do those things with wood have certainly been an integral part of the human survival skills set, and being able to envision a house or chair from a stand of trees is remarkable in itself, woodcraft has developed well beyond it utilitarian origins.

The artistic side of woodcraft has drawn ever more people to take it up, and each new convert is just the latest in a centuries-long chain of master woodworkers which was old when the ancient Egyptians were carving wood coffins for their deceased Pharaohs.

Woodcraft is a blend of artistic inspiration, highly developed manual dexterity, and perserverance. It is nothing if not highly challenging and equally satisfying. its produces fine sculptures and decorative frames; it accomplishes things impossible in other media like metal, ceramic, and glass; being able to form wood into shapes is ability entirely different from those needed to sculpt other substances. Properly finishing woodcraft is another area in which specific training is highly recommended.

Ancient Woodcraft

The history of woodcraft demands the respect of all who presume to practice it. Wooden vessels dating back to the Stone Age have been found and in northern Germany and Denmark Bronze Age woodcrafters fashioned coffins from trees. Germany is also the site of wooden animal figurines dating back to the Iron Age.
But the greatest of the ancient woodcraft artists may have been the Chinese couple Lu Ban and his wife Lady Yun, who are credited with bringing the chalkline and plane to China. The book “Lu Ban Jin,” written some fifteen centuries following his death, contains the dimensions of many wooden items, including altars, tables, and flower containers, which he is said to have built. But it does not disclose the greatest woodcraft secret of all: how the Chinese woodcrafters developed their technique for fitting their woodcraft so precisely that it required neither glue nor nails.

The Future Of Woodcraft

The 21st century is as much a century of woodcraft as any which has gone before; almost every home has wood in its construction, architectural features, and furniture. And each of them is the end result of techniques millennia in the making.

If you are feeling the appeal of woodcraft, and want to give it a try, just be patient in your efforts. What you are attempting seems to come as naturally to humans as breathing and eating, so somewhere in you past there was very likely a woodcrafter!