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A Furniture Maker's House

Of the many woodworkers who make fine early American furniture reproductions, few use old lumber, and fewer if any at all use windows, doors, shutters and hardware as they are found. Usually a wood worker will plane and sand an old piece of wood before using it. Not Bryce Ritter. He will take a pile of seemingly useless material and turn it into pretty, practical pieces of furniture that generally fit almost any décor.

Bryce moved back to Pennsylvania twelve years ago. He then bought the 1790 Chester County property where he and his wife, Linda, now live.

Bryce buys his material wherever he can find it. "I'm always looking for old lumber, doors, shutters, hardware and so on," he said.

The walls of Bryce Ritter's workshop are covered with interesting items, including many pieces of old hardware. Hanging over the workbenches are plenty of well used templates. He works alone in the shop using a variety of tools, including power equipment such as a table saw, a band saw, a lathe, a drill press and a mortising machine. The last is quite helpful for anyone making mortise and tenon joints–it literally drills square holes.

Bryce also uses a wide range of hand tools which include molding planes, saws, chisels, mallets etc. With the combination of power and hand tools, he can build nearly any type of furniture requested–and anything from large, open-top cupboards with reproduction rat tail hinges to pencil post and cannon ball bedsteads.

Although he uses classic designs, he does alter items for today. An example is a stretcher base dining table with drawers. The original had a box stretcher design. A drawback is that when diners use the table, their feet and the chair legs run into the low side stretchers. So, Bryce changed the stretcher design to an "H" shape. With it, there are no side stretchers to get in the way. Instead, there is along central one, running end to end, well out of the way. Looking at the finished table, with its red painted base and scrubbed top, the design seemed so well proportioned that no one ever would know it wasn't a true copy.

Bryce does his best to find unusual, original color combinations to copy. For example, we think of Windsor chairs as being solid, dark colors. But, he found some with bright original paint. They had a different color on the seat than that on the rest of the chair. These led to some whimsical color combinations.

Bryce has also created and promotes his own "American Artist Show". Held each summer in a field across the road from their rural Downingtown home, it features many artisans. "We have tents, food, and lots of activity at the show," he said.