Fairbank points to a marquetry cutting machine, based on an 18th-
century model, that his studio mate Peter Davis engineered himself.
Paul Chandeysson, working on the other side, is influenced by
Biedermeier. Both, with years of experience behind them, assist
Fairbank when he encounters a problem executing a project. “Just
to see this going on in a shared studio is the closest real-life model
to the wonderful cross-pollination that happens in college,” he says.
In Fairbank’s portion of the studio, a three-leaved dining-room
table, a work in progress, overpowers the space. It is still unprimed
oak, with a squarish modern apron and Queen Anne legs, white
and freshly scraped. I keep looking back at the table and at Fairbank,
trying to grasp that this was made by him. Not a brawny man, he
is dwarfed by it. The piece, as it turns out, was a challenge passed
on to him by a demanding customer. “They wanted something with
a neoclassical leg on a minimalist form. I’m challenged by my clients
all the time; the work is always more demanding than I think it’s
going to be.” What’s more, Fairbank had never made a leaf table
before, so it was a process of trial and error. He bought two or three
commercial sliders for the underside, but they didn’t support the
weight of the tabletop. Besides, they felt cheap. He referenced
some
Fine JVoodworking
articles online and made his first sliders.
Success. The result is an underside with three sets of wooden glides
as beautifully crafted and considered as the rest of the sturdy,
flawless table. But it took weeks of head-scratching. Fairbank
hopes that his customers will take notice. He wants to change the
culture of disposable furniture. “When you’re buying at West Elm,
not only are the materials substandard, but the cost of designing
has been amortized,” he says. “I want to make items that are going
to be heirlooms. I want to convince people that furniture can be
an investment.”
Though a lifetime growing up around handcrafted American
furniture pieces in his mother’s shop gave Fairbank a magpie eye
for odd historical details and an appreciation of fine carpentry,
his furniture displays a highly polished urban minimalism, informed
by the works of Philippe Starck and Donald Judd. And while the
Apollo Console, an extreme statement credenza with a hand-
rubbed turquoise lacquer finish and a dark cerused oak, has an easy
industrial modernity to it, the process is in fact, for Fairbank, a
painstaking one. After applying tinted polyurethane lacquer, two
coats of primer are applied, then three coats of lacquer. Each coat
takes 36 hours of drying time before another application. After the
final lacquer coat is applied, the surface must be wet-sanded start-
ing at 400 grit and progressively with finer papers all the way to
1000 grit. The surface is then buffed with a wheel with a polishing
compound equivalent to 2000 grit, bringing the finish to the shine
of glass. >
aug/scp 10 american craft 047
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