A recent discussion about James Krenov sent me to his Web page. I can
not, for the life of me, understand the appeal of those curious little
curio cabinets he builds. The bases seem totally out of scale with
the cabinets that sit on them.

After a day of playing in the shop, I sat down last night and started
looking through some old issues of Woodwork magazine. There seems to
be a lot more emphasis on design in this magazine than in most others.
I looked at many of the highlighted pieces they showed and, while I
am sure the joinery was fine, many of the pieces were merely objects
d'art. I realized that I held these pieces of "art furniture" in
scorn since there seemed to be little function to complement the form.

Why, I wonder, would a person like Krenov who has the skills required
to build beautiful AND functional furniture limit himself to building
trifles.

Dick Durbin
Tallahassee