About The Site

  As I was taking the courses at l’Atelier et l’École d’Ébénisterie in St. Jerome,

I decided that I would need to invest in my own shop … here are some photos … to make a long story short, it took quite a bit more time and effort to get operational than I would have expected.  For anyone thinking of doing the same, I am happy to chat about my experiences and some of the advice I was given.

  This was originally built as an unheated shed, 22′ X 16′ , with a second floor.  When I decided that I wanted to set up a shop, my wife said “You should have planned for that and made it bigger …”.  Unfortunately, I did not know at the time, so I had a lot of work to do to winterize it, and also find a way to configure the tools within the space available.

When you step in through the door on the left side, the planer is immediately to the left and the mitre saw is on the right.  The table saw is in the centre of the shop and is the only machine that is not easily moved.

From the door looking straight across the room is the router, with an enclosure to help collect the dust.  To the left and in the centre of the shop is the table saw, with a sliding (Excaliber) table which I find invaluable.

The mortise macine (also invaluable for precise joints) … and the oscillating sander.  I need to add a good belt sander for those larger jobs.

To the left is the jointer … and the dust collector which I can move around.  I have not fixed the piping for the dust collection, since when my brother-in-law was visiting, he strongly suggested that I neeeded to expand my workshop.  I agree, but time is limited for now …

   And climbing to the second floor we have …

    … you can see that I did not yet finish the work to install the ceiling … I was too anxious to get the shop operational …