The classes start at 9:00 am on weekends and 8:00 on weekdays.  The school usually opens a little early so you get a chance to socialize or make some progress if you're behind.  This is my first view of the school.

This is Graham Blackburn.  Graham is a master woodworker trained in Europe.  He a great teacher and a really interesting guy.  For example, he played the saxophone at Woodstock.  He started the day with about an hour on design and wood movement.

After the design overview we he went straight into cutting dovetails.  For our practice piece, we cut the tails without measuring.

You can't see him here but at the Marc Adams school they have a camera operator with two cameras and monitors to get close up shots while the instructor is demonstrating a skill.  Those cameras do a lot to help you see exactly what he's doing.

Before I got started on my tails, I took this picture of the class.  My bench is partially off camera on the right.  The couple that was front and center was Ed and Barb.  They were a really neat husband and wife team that have produced some terrific projects.  We ended up becoming friends.

I had only hand cut dovetails once before this class but they came out terrible and I think I got the tails and the pins mixed up.  However, I have pretty good backsaw control because I've been cutting tenons by hand for a while now.  These are my first tails in the class.  Graham said they were "perfect" and singled me out for a tougher challenge later in the class.  Even though they were "perfect" he told me my shoulders were too small.

This is Ed and Graham discussing the finer points of hand cut dovetails.

My "tougher challenge" turned out to be dovetails with very small pins.  Cutting very small pins makes the tails more difficult to cut because the saw wants to follow the first kerf when you cut the second one.  Also, when you mark for and chisel out the pins you don't have very much room.

From left to right, Marc Adams, me, and Graham Blackburn.

After the practice dovetails were finished we went right into the project.  They kept telling us that if we could cut dovetails in 3/4" red oak we could cut them in anything. :-)  These turned out pretty well.  Just a little cleaning up with a block plane and they'll be all set.

Graham told me my dovetails were "incredibly good".  I'm pretty susceptible to flattery so it went right to my head. :-)

I was a little faster than the rest of the class so I was the only guy who actually started (or finished) the carving on Sunday.  Again, carving in red oak isn't the easiest thing to do but I got most of the kinks worked out in my practice piece.  My new friend Ed took this picture.

This is another picture of me doing the carving.

When I left the class the only thing I had left to do was to mortise out the hinges and attach the lid.  The entire project was done by hand so this task was no different.

The screws that came with the hinges were 3/4" long so I used a pair of wire cutters to take 1/8" or so off the end.  At 3/4" I was running the risk of poking out the other side of the lid.

Using brass screws in red oak is just asking to twist the head off so I was really careful on my pre-drilling.  I managed to get it all done without breaking a screw.

This is the finished box.  It's all hand planed, hand carved, and of course it has hand cut dovetails.

A view from the side.

The mortised hinges and the inside.