Jackson and Brent discuss modern craftsmanship, and how it would benefit from the ways it used to be done. They are on a mission to improve craft and relearn the past, one house at a time.
When I started my small joinery business 5 years ago, I started with the motto “ I don’t make windows, I make happy clients”. I’ve not spent a cent on advertising or marketing and yet everyday day I get a weeks worth of work enquiries. As a consequence I’ve become very good at turning down work, which took practice. I choose the interesting projects and attempt to educate the client on the process, explaining what I do isn’t quick and it’s not cheap compared to alternative products that do the same job with lesser materials. For the projects I’m not interested in, I explain I’m booked out for a minimum of six months (true) and make recommendations as to alternative businesses they could look at, it doesn’t help a client to just say no and leave it like that. The benefit of this is that my “competition” appreciates me putting clients onto them and are happy to help me out on the few occasions I’ve needed their assistance. If profit figures, profit margins, turnover etc. are your only method of business management, you’re missing out on real opportunities to extend your business.
This is a fantastic conversation. I work on software product design, and so much of this translates directly. I suppose they're more signs of human interaction / individual psychology than specific to one industry. Great show, guys!
This is such an incredible book. I don't generally read books more than once, but this one warrants multiple reads. This podcast was fantastic. Thank you.
Back when I was sound designer for games. The last creative director I work with we were in his office talking and basically he said to me 'we're not going to do any of your ideas we're going to my ides and because I have no ideas we're not going to do anything.'
The Hammond Harwood house: in the picture they showed, its nice, but, kind of meh, however if you zoom out to see the wings, wow, awesome. Except one thing: the window above the front door isn't centered. It really bothers me, just like Mt Vernon. edit: nor is the pediment centered. I'm sad.
Having 'cut the cord' a decade ago, I was unaware that Brent had a TV show. It seems like the current work would have enough content to put a few seasons together as long as clients allowed their work to be shown.
I’m late to listening to this episode so I don’t know if you will see this comment or not but I work in Marketing and I would highly recommend listening to the book Story Brand by Donald Miller on Audible. He talks through how to create a powerful elevator pitch that invites your customer into a story and clearly tell them what your business does :). Let me know if you listen to it I would love to hear what you think. :)
The modern 48" barricade rule is an OSHA thing more related to construction. Remember, they're trying to protect a construction worker carrying a ladder or wooden planks.
From my RU-vid video experience, Veneer Plaster uses nylon tape on the seams and corners and trowels everything smoothly with no sanding. Drywall Mud gets sanded after each layer of application. Plaster is a harder, more durable product.
I run a small joinery business in Adelaide, South Australia, making traditional style timber windows and doors among other things. I agree to a point on the insulated glass, it’s thermally fantastic but doesn’t last forever. Over here we have high performance laminated glass called comfort plus, which cuts down UV and solar heat transfer almost as effectively as a non coated double glazed unit, it’s great for traditional sash and casement windows. I wonder if there’s a similar product in the US?
We need to put different building designs into separate contexts. To take your Sunday Shot to achieve a constantly low blower door score, then you can't have fireplaces. Your ventahood has to have supply and exhaust with positively sealing doors, and your home has to have a mechanical ventilation system. With all of that in place, you can score the below zero blower door scores. Start raising the number for fireplaces or open ventahoods, etc. In other words, you have to design to the level of efficiency you require for your client.
And let's not even bring up FRESH AIR! It's all relative. The problem we are facing now are the conflicting standards. Even within the IRC, the rules conflict, for example, gas piping. The old rule used to be that you couldn't run a gas line anywhere you couldn't put your nose on it. That wasn't very practical so then they said, well you can run it in the wall cavity, but you have to overbore the penetrating hole in the top plate to allow gas to pass thru so that 1) it doesn't create a bomb potential within the wall cavity, and 2) it escapes and hopefully someone will eventually smell the mercaptans. I could live with that. Fast forward to 2018 and now the fire code says you must have fire blocking (which has been around for quite a while), PLUS you must use a fire retardant sealant and seal off that overbored hole around the gas line that could potentially allow a fire to pass through! Hello!?!? Which one you want??? Answer? Get with the inspector and see which way he's leaning. The real answer is that someone at the IRC needs to take charge and eliminate the ambiguity.
Very interesting episode! In ranking these, I'm confused as to the difficulty level on whether you're discussing building the most difficult or designing the most difficult - and get it right? To me, almost anyone can learn to build something, and almost no one gets it right design-wise. Or are you referring to a master-builder, getting it right both design & build? I'm biased living in Louisiana, and it gives me insight to this Louisiana French Colonial and/or Acadian style, and i'd venture to say that style is EXTREMELY difficult to get right. 5 out of 10 people in Louisiana will tell you they have an Acadian style house and 9.9999999 out of 10 I can guarantee you, don't have an authentically correctly built and/or designed Acadian house. I think it all falls back on the shoulders of design. Most builders today can adapt to building things correctly, but most designers canNOT adapt quickly to start designing correctly.
I was born in 1950. The pre-WWII and post WWII building technology is rooted in our WWII Industrial Technology. We won the war by out producing Germany Technologically. We trained our leaders how to outperform their contemporaries through standardization and duplication. Cost reduction was the next plane of competition. So, we have compromised our craftsmanship and lowered our standards in order to complete our race to the bottom. More is less! 😢
Modern Union Systems have replaced the Guilds, more or less. The Building Trades Organizations have created contracts to declare what jurisdiction governs the respective trades. Electrical Unions supervise the installation of the supports for all electrical devices, including the welders that install those support members. The Pipefitter's install the pipe supports and piping. The Ironworkers install the structural components. The Contractor's Associations maintain the suggested pricing catalogs.
I'd love to hear more about how to do Victorian on a budget. We've checked out salvage in the area, but it's hard to tell what's appropriate and authentic and what's not.
I'm sure the Industrial Revolution made it easier to mass produce hand planes just like everything else. If they're cheaper/more accessible you'll have more people buying them.
Hi guys. I’m looking at a Dutch Colonial Revival built 1924. What are the odds I find it in a home catalog? And what year would I want to check out? Thanks!
You're waffling a bit, is traditional building more expensive or not? Are knowledgeable builders more expensive? Does it have to be that way? I mean slate > asphalt, redwood > hardy > cedar (but today's cedar isn't great), ipe > trex > treated spf. But it's the skilled installation that really costs more. Like most things in our economy, labor > materials and everyone wants a high standard of living but they don't want or can't afford to pay for others to live it. Too much of this eventually comes back to the increasing wealth gap. But one main solution is for all homeowners/buyers to be much more aware so they can fight for rain screens and quality wood and the correct wood choice and proper installation. Someone should target a podcast/ video series at educating homeowners from the basics up.
The city of Troy in New York is a great example of a really affordable property and beautiful historic houses and apartments. So much so that when the HBO series The Gilded Age which is set in NYC actually shoot their exterior shots in Troy like they have so much original gilded age architecture. It was one of the forth biggest city and was one of the most prosperous cities in the United States at the time and had a huge industry which brought and made extremely wealthy family who then built these magnificent gilded age mansions and some of the earliest cast iron buildings. Unfortunately and fortunately, the steel industry moved west after the civil war and the city slowly was forgotten as an industry Mecca. And like there was a mass exodus very little new development has been done and mostly has remained the same aka beautiful period architecture intact.
Brent should talk more about modern architecture. I’m not entirely clear on whether he thinks Greco-Roman is the only way. Surely the Japanese and mid-century Americans would have something to say. Brent’s video on Mies’ Farnsworth house is fantastic. When is minimalism lazy vs sublime?
I think Brent is wrong on this one: I routinely work with designers who draw up mimimalist and modern farmhouse custom homes, Fine Homebuilding magazine is full of custom builds just like that, and every one of the new development of 1 million dollar custom homes near me looks just like that and had a designer that thought it looked great. They design what people want, and people want what is popular, and modern minimalism is the fad. Blind leading the blind.
