Guides & articles
The brass hinge popped off my walnut box at the worst possible moment: two days before I was supposed to hand it to my sister. I had screwed it straight into end grain, which is basically asking a pie...
Handcraft
You are standing in a craft shop aisle, or more likely staring at two browser tabs, and the same question keeps surfacing: do I buy the wool, the linen, the real leather, or do I buy the acrylic yarn,...
Handcraft
Most craft injuries I hear about aren't dramatic. They're a headache after three hours of working with solvent-based glue in a closed room, a rash from epoxy that shows up two days later, or a paint-s...
Handcraft
Most makers price from the gut. Materials cost roughly this much, the last one sold for that much, so this one should probably be similar. That approach works until a busy month leaves you with a full...
Handcraft
You have cut your fabric, pinned two pieces together, and then it hits you: how far from the edge do I actually sew? Get this wrong and your finished piece is either too tight to wear or too baggy to...
Handcraft
Water is the quiet enemy of handmade goods. A candle that sweats in a humid room, a leather bag that stains after one rainstorm, a wood bowl that cracks because it dried too fast. By the end of this g...
Handcraft
If you sell what you make, the price you charge has to cover more than the pretty fabric or the wax or the clay. It has to cover every gram, every inch of thread, every scrap you cut off and tossed. B...
Handcraft
If you have ever stood in a yarn aisle holding a pattern that says "4 mm hook, worsted weight" and wondered whether the skein in your hand is actually worsted, this guide is for you. By the end, you w...
Handcraft
You bought a strand of beads online, they arrived, and they are nothing like the photo. Too small, too big, or worse, the holes are so tight your wire will not pass through. The listing said "6mm" and...
Handcraft
Yarn math is the part of blanket making nobody warns you about. Run out at row 180 of 200 and you have a problem: dye lots rarely match perfectly, and a substitute yarn can change how the whole thing...
Handcraft
You are about to start a project and the pattern says "6 skeins of worsted weight." Or worse, you are designing something yourself and there is no pattern at all. You want to buy once, not make three...
Handcraft
You bought a board, measured twice, cut once, and it still came up short. Or worse, the "1 x 6" you ordered arrived looking nothing like an inch thick or six inches wide. If that sounds familiar, the...
Handcraft