Law Library Philadelphia, PA

In October of 1992, I went to work for Rick F., who had a small design/build company, and by small, I mean after he hired me, there was him and me. He had taken this job, building an architect designed library of solid cherry and a clerestory, the large skylight type structure, for a couple on 21st St, Bob and Eileen.

They were both lawyers, I believe in the same firm, and Bob was President of the Philadelphia Bar at that time. Rick had very limited woodworking experience, which is why he hired me. Some of the larger moldings we had milled offsite, like the crown molding that tops the whole room (solid cherry) and the large crown-type molding under the mantlepiece. Everything else we milled onsite, and it turned out beautifully, I must say. I talked Rick into doing a hand rubbed linseed oil finish, which upon retuning a couple years later, still had the deepest, richest luster you could imagine.

About half way throught the finishing process at this point. The hand tubbing took a long time, but was worth it.

Rick was nearly impossible to work for...he was extremely high strung and immature. I summoned all the Buddha-nature I could muster to stay one step ahead of his unpredictible moods. At one point, he decided he wanted to rout the edge of the large piece of cherry that was to be the mantle. Half way throught the process, he panicked and lifted the router up, destroying the front edge. When I saved his ass by taking out my hand planes and making the mistake nothing but a bad memory, he gave me my props, and stayed out of my way.

The woodworking here was challenging, but straight forward. The most difficult part, besides putting up with Rick,were the end panels of the clerestory. Essentially, the oval windows are "trimmed" with a solid piece of furniture grade flakeboard, with a half inch reveal around the window, and scribed to the curved panelled ceiling. Then four pieces were overlaid, with another half inch reveal at the window, and creating half inch channels perfectly aligned with the window mullions, again all scribed tight to the cieling, and with a relflected half- oval cutout at the top. I was pretty proud of how that turned out, but if Rick hadn't been such a nut, I probably would have said "How the hell are we supposed to do that?" instead of "No Problemo."








The only picture I have of this is kind of blotchy



I worked for Rick for 4 or 5 years, somehow. When I became aware of some of his subs calling me "Poor Nevin," I decided it was time to leave.