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Greetings Fellow Woodworkers,
As we look forward to the new year, I hope this letter finds you, your friends, and families well. The new year can be an exciting time, packed with anticipation for what the upcoming months hold. Many people plan vacations, home improvement projects, and even lifestyle changes. Some make resolutions and use the new year as a new beginning. For me, I like to look forward to large upcoming projects and reflect upon what the past year has held and taught me.
At Popular Woodworking, we’ve had some big initiatives over this last year, and the new year will see some of those plans come to fruition. We’re reinvesting in our digital offering — expanding on our already robust website and putting focus into producing more digital content. It’s my plan that a large portion of that digital offering be new video content … an area that’s been lacking the resources to build upon over the last few years.
From the magazine standpoint, I’m putting together a list of contributing writers that I think you’ll enjoy. While I’ll continue to contribute a project or technique almost every issue (such as milling your own lumber), I want to highlight true masters of the craft. Some of the names I think you’ll recognize from years past. Others, you may discover for the first time. Regardless, I think you’ll enjoy reading their tips, techniques, and projects.
As I’ve mentioned before, I want to keep driving content back toward traditional tools and techniques, as that’s my passion. But this doesn’t mean all hand tools, all the time (though, I would love that). It just means down-to-earth, quality woodworking.
However, I recognize that there’s a large portion of you that are interested in the latest, cutting-edge woodworking technology. With that in mind, I’d like to invite those of you interested in CNC to keep an eye on our website. We’re looking to start offering bi-weekly blog posts focused on CNC and digital woodworking. In addition, Chris Fitch (Popular Woodworking and Woodsmith magazine’s technology editor) has released an on-going how-to series on CNC basics, that we’ve titled CNC Basecamp.
So, what are my big projects and plans for this year? Well, I have a long list. But, at the top of it is going to be building a new shop that will become the second home for Popular Woodworking. This ground-up build will be a fun experience and I’m excited to bring everyone along for the journey. From planning the shop layout, utilities, dust collection, and material workflow, I think there’s something that everyone can take away and apply to their own shops.
As we step into this new year, I can’t help but say that I’m excited. Excited to continue sharing this craft we all love with each and every one of you. My hope is that within the pages of the magazine, on the website, or in a video, you’ll find little gems of knowledge. And you’ll take those little gems of knowledge and bring them into your shop and apply them to your woodworking. The tip, technique, or project may be exactly what you were looking for. Or, it might not work how you needed it too, and that’s okay as well — as long as you had fun trying it and learned something.
Now of course, we do all of this for you. With that in mind, I’d love to hear from you, and any feedback you have. Project ideas, feedback on articles, questions or snippy remarks … my email is always open, and I promise to do my best to read and respond to every email I receive.
I hope you had a great holiday season, and thank you for being here.
Happy woodworking,
Logan Wittmer
Editor in Chief, Popular Woodworking
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