HANDCRAFT FINE FURNITURE AROUND THE ALBEMARLE

With sawdust at their feet and the scent of freshly planed wood in the air, a class of six novice furniture makers put the final touches on bedside tables they have just handcrafted. Instructing the class is Benjamin C. Hobbs, a cabinetmaker who teaches weeklong fine furniture-making classes from his rural northeastern North Carolina home.

The students come from throughout the United States to spend a week with Hobbs on his 30 acres in Perquimans County in the Albemarle region of North Carolina. They may be dentists, attorneys or gardeners in their workday lives, but upon completion of Hobbs’ class they are transformed into furniture makers. They leave for home with their own handmade reproduction of an elegant Colonial-era piece of furniture and fond memories from a week of hard and rewarding work.

In the 1700s, North Carolina’s Albemarle region was an important furniture-making center and Hobbs draws on this rich heritage in his classes. Hobbs stresses traditional designs, hand tools and eighteenth-century furniture making techniques.

Trained as an educator and a cabinetmaker over 20 years, Hobbs has offered the weeklong classes since 1995. Since that time, Hobbs has been featured in Fine Woodworking magazine and Woodworkers Journal.
“ Hobbs is a natural teacher with an easy smile and a just-firm enough approach to woodworking,” said Tim Schreiner, editor of Fine Woodworking magazine and a student in one of Hobbs’ classes.
Classes at Benjamin Hobbs Furniture are offered in Queen Anne benches, Chippendale chairs, dovetail boxes, pencil post beds, hanging corner cupboards and other pieces. Tuition /includes instruction and materials for a piece of furniture.

Beechtree Inn, the on-site bed & breakfast where students stay, contribute to the experience. In addition to his appreciation of fine early American furniture, Hobbs has a fondness for pre-Civil War buildings. He and his wife Jackie have collected and moved onto their property 17 buildings dating from mid-eighteenth to mid-nineteenth centuries. To date, three have been restored and furnished with Ben’s furniture and are the centerpiece of Beechtree Inn. Although the cottages are historic, guests are afforded all the comforts expected of the twenty-first century—including television, private baths and mini-refrigerators.

For more information about Benjamin Hobbs Furniture and Beechtree Inn, contact Ben and Jackie Hobbs at bhobbs@hobbsfurniture.com; 252/426-7815; 948 Pender Road, Hertford, NC 27944.
www.hobbsfurniture.com

Thanks to the Perquimans Chamber of Commerce for this information.  http://www.visitperquimans.com/content/Features/HobbsFeature.shtml

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