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My Shaving Horse
Carving,Crafts,Furniture / September 28, 2021

In this post, I describe my shaving horse with all of its features. It is based on a historic design. I
also include a working sketch of this shaving horse with measurements.
Below is the companion video for this blog post:

My shaving horse is my favorite tool. We’ve been together for over 30 years. It is the first one I
ever built. I’ve worked on different shaving horses, and I thought about building a new and different
one at times, but this one suits me just fine. The design for my horse came from a county farm
museum near my home. I don’t know the history or the date of the original. The farm museum
opened in 1852. 

Although I don’t know the history behind this particular shaving horse, it is a tried and true design.
This design is German in origin, and often referred to as the dumbhead design. Perhaps it is a design
that was perfected over decades. I don’t know. But I do know that this shaving horse has been able
to hold almost everything I’ve ever tried to hold with it. It has features that make it easy to use, and
it has built-in adjustability for different size works. 
My Original Sketch

The original sketch is in a 8″ x 11″ book. The sketch here was divided in half for this post. 
Updated Working Sketch
The following sketch is based on the shaving horse as it exists now in my shop. I made a few
modifications which are explained with photo examples that follow.
 
It sits about 17.5 inches above the floor. The drawing above (which can be enlarged) details the
major measurements. All measurements are in inches. My shaving horse was built from 1.5 inch
thick rough-cut red oak.

Today’s Working Shaving Horse

I will modify almost anything, including a tool, if it will serve me better. In 1990, I built this
shaving horse according to my sketch and used it for several years without changing it. But over the
years, I thought about changes that would make it better for the way I was using it. I use this
shaving horse for primarily two purposes: chair legs and rungs, and making Native American style
flatbows (as shown in the top image of this post). Recently, I made an addition for the shaving horse
to help me carve large bowls. Of course, I often find other uses for the shaving horse since it lives in
the shop and is handy for other small tasks.
This photo shows one large modification to the original design – I shortened the length by about 14
inches. I did this by cutting off the far end opposite from where I sit. You can see that there is a
square spacer between the inclined board and the bottom horizontal seat board. In my original
sketch from 1990, you can see that the horizontal seat board met the inclined work surface at one
end where they were joined together. 
Another modification that I made was to taper the front of the inclined work surface board. The
reason that I tapered it was to give me more clearance when working with the drawknife. A wide
surface might seem better, but it really isn’t necessary. Sometimes when drawknifing a small piece
of work, I found that the inclined work surface got in the way while angling the drawknife down on
one side.

Lastly, compare the above view to my original sketch. You will see that the inclined work surface is
very much shorter than the original, antique shaving horse. I found very quickly that I needed to use
my drawknife close to the head. The very long and wide inclined work surface just got in the way,
so I cut it off.
This view shows the clamping head that faces me when I’m sitting on the horse. Note that each side
of the head is a different height. This is one of the great features of this shaving horse. I can work
with wood of different thicknesses without having to change the height of the head. Note also that I
stapled leather on the clamping head. The leather provides some padding for delicate work.
From Shaving Horse to Bowl Horse

Several years ago, I tried my hand at making hand-carved, greenwood bowls from tree sections. I
quickly found that I needed something to hold the bowl so I could carve any outside surface on the
bowl. I searched the internet and found plans for a bowl horse. I built a bowl horse and it served the
purpose of holding the bowls. The problem was I didn’t really have room in my small shop for a
shaving horse, a bowl horse, and a spoon mule that I use for making spoons. At least one of them
had to go away. It was the bowl horse.
Before I gave the bowl horse to my good friend, I studied the horse to determine if I could build an
attachment to my shaving horse and convert it into temporary bowl horse. The photo above shows
my bowl horse attachment for my shaving horse. I can easily hold a bowl that is 24 inches long. 
Photos of the Shaving Horse and Bowl Horse in Action

This is a typical position when shaving a rung for a Jenny Alexander chair. 
This view shows me beginning to work on an osage orange bow stave. I often use only one foot to
clamp the head down.
This view shows how I work with the stave angled across me. This flexibility in this shaving horse
design is very nice. This is where this shaving horse design really shines. The open sides of the
clamping head allow me to work with such a long piece of wood such as this bow stave. It is so
easy to just insert the piece from the side. 
This is how I use the bowl horse attachment. I usually lean into the attachment with my chest.
Another view of the bowl horse attachment.
My shaving horse has served me well for many years. Like I said in the beginning, I’ve thought
about making a different design at times, but then I ask myself, why? This shaving horse does
everything I ask it to do, except one thing – it doesn’t fit in my compact car. 

A Take-down Version of My Shaving Horse

Recently, I built a take-down version of this shaving horse as shown below. This take-down version
easily fits into my compact car since I use the shaving horse for demonstrations at festivals.
This view shows the disassembled take-down shaving horse. As you can see above, there really
aren’t many pieces to this shaving horse: four legs, a foot rung, a rung for the adjustable height
clamp head, a seat board, a riser board, a clamping head, and two spacer blocks to support the riser
board. 

The assembled take-down shaving horse. It takes about five minutes to assemble the horse. The legs
have the same type of tapered mortices used in making Windsor chairs. The shaving horse is held
firmly together with two stove bolts that descend through the incline board, spacer blocks, and seat
board. The spacer blocks have registration pins to prevent the blocks from turning and I use wing
nuts to tighten the stove bolts under the seat board. 

Conclusion
I built my shaving horse in 1990 based on a design from one I saw at a local farm museum. There
was no internet back then, so I couldn’t research by just typing in a couple of words, hitting the
‘enter’ button, and getting a screen full of links about shaving horses. Back then, I could only go to
the public library. But the public library didn’t have anything about such an obscure topic. 
In 1989, I purchased the now well known book Make a Chair From a Tree by then John (now
Jennie) Alexander. The book was full of black and white photographs and inspired me to do exactly
what the title said. It was the only book that detailed how to make a chair in a way I could easily
understand. The book had John’s version of a shaving horse, but then I found the one at the farm
museum and decided to copy that one. 
A third edition of Make a Chair from a Tree is still available from Lost Art Press. Additionally,
Lost Art Press even produced a video with the same title.
The shaving horse design in this blog post is one of the less common designs you will find if you
search the internet. A more common, yet historic design, is the bodgers shaving horse recently
popularized by Peter Follansbee in his video Build a Shaving Horse with Peter Follansbee. Note
that I do not profit from the links in this post.
In the end, I prefer my shaving horse design for the reasons stated in this blog post.

My most recent posts:

• Make a Hover Ball Game from Bamboo!

• My Shaving Horse
• The Magical Gee Haw Whammy Diddle
• Make a Shrink Pot Lid, Step by Step Instructions
• Make a Shrink Pot: Step by Step Instructions
• Make Sauerkraut with your Cabbage Crusher!
• Turn a Cabbage Crusher or a Sauerkraut Press!
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