Resident Mastery Program

The Resident Mastery Program in Woodworking

Asian Style Cabinet by Tom Nichols

The Resident Mastery Program offers an intensive nine month course of study in fine furniture making. Up to four Resident students a year are given bench space in the Studio studying the techniques of hand and power tool use, joinery, fine cabinet construction, finishing, and design.

The course of study lasts for nine months starting in October. The application deadline is September 15th. Students will be able to work in the Studio Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Students will spend each week at the bench designing and building both Design and Studio Projects.

Design Projects have been chosen to teach certain methods, techniques, and approaches while at the same time allowing each student room to explore his or her own style. Studio projects have been selected to illustrate techniques while building useful and practical objects. These include items such as jigs and hand tools, tool boxes and shop storage drawers as well as some smaller shop items like sawhorses and stools.

With an emphasis on furniture design, students will emerge from the program with a sense of how to design fine furniture. They will develop a signature style of their own while building pieces with the goal of producing gallery quality. The practical aspects of the program however cannot be overlooked as students will learn effective machine use and maintenance, production building, and shop set-up.

As a prerequisite to the Resident Mastery Program we ask students to come and take a week long Masterworks class with us. The Joinery Concentrations are a perfect introduction to the Studio, working with Gary, and the effort required to be a Resident Mastery student.

Listen to current Mastery Student Shea Vollstedt describe his first project:

Pacific Northwest Tool Collectors have been generous enough to offer scholarships to students over 17 seeking career and technical education. The scholarships can be applied toward tuition at Northwest Woodworking Studio. More information about the PNTC scholarship can be found on their website

Paul Dumond of Dumond’s Custom Furniture in Corvallis, Montana has also generously offered scholarship money to all qualified Mastery students. To read more please see his page http://dumonds.com/arts-scholarship/