Bent Laminations, Steam Bending, and Veneered Panels

Instructor:  Craig Stevens

• To be scheduled

Straight boards and 90-degree joinery are so square! Take a more meandering path and explore bent laminations, steam bending, and making curved panels in this 2-day bending and curves workshop. Through demonstrations and hands-on work, participants practice a variety of bending techniques and methods for working with curved components. 

The class will cover resawing solid wood into laminations, constructing curved forms, adhesive choices, and using the vacuum press and 2-part forms to make regular and tapered bent laminations. 

Hands-on steam bending begins with unraveling the technique itself; how it works, steam-box construction and methods for generating steam as well as appropriate wood selection, bending techniques, and making proper forms are carefully examined. Students practice several steam-bent sample projects.

Next, curved veneered panels offer nearly unlimited design opportunities for woodworkers. This portion of the course explains how curved panels are incorporated into furniture projects and the techniques for getting the best results. Demonstrations and discussions cover working with veneers, choices for core material, edge-banding, form-making, and glue up strategies. 

Finally, we demonstrate sawing curved components directly from solid wood planks. Suggestions for wood grain selection, methods of creating identical pieces, and working with the resulting curved furniture parts help students get the most from this very accessible technique.

We’ll also discuss modern materials and adhesives that make bent work approachable; kerfed MDF (Neatform) and bendable plywood (Wigglewood) as well as adhesives such as Unibond 800 (2-part urea resin glue) are excellent for this type of work.

Students complete the course with sample curves, a new set of advanced skills, and full of ideas for creating expressive designs.

Cost includes all materials. Students provide their own lunch.

No tools are required for this class