Precision down to the final flourish
Ever wanted to travel through time? Those seeking the spirit of the past will truly alive at MebS in Poland.
Solid wood carvings and other ornaments are the hallmarks of this traditional furniture style, which originates from Poland. We visited the MebS furniture joinery and watched the experts at work.
The MebS furniture team gives us a warm welcome to Sierakowice, a small village of 7000 inhabitants near Gdańsk in Poland. The joinery and carpenter's workshop has called this place home for over 20 years. Furniture is still made by hand here, employing the techniques passed down from the workshops of the old city of Gdańsk, or Danzig as it was previously known. Gdańsk has a long history of furniture making – indeed, the city first started making furnishings in the 18th century. Even back then, the workshops produced opulent pieces of solidly built furniture, typically featuring intricate embellishments, curved shapes and lavish ornamentations inspired by the Baroque style prevalent at the time. The primary materials included high-grade kinds of wood such as walnut, ebony and rosewood.
Furniture manufactory meets handicraft
Over the years, furniture manufacture has gradually turned into handicraft, and today these magnificent pieces are primarily made for decorative purposes. The owner of MebS, Bartlomiej Jóskowski, takes us to the entrance hall first: "You've come at just the right time. We're currently working on some great living room furniture that will give you an illuminating insight into our work." The workshop's furniture exhibition stretches across the entire ground floor in front of us. Walking through these sacred halls, it's immediately clear that they take pride in their artistry. The entrance hall is filled with pieces featuring adornments that evoke traditional maritime motifs and acanthus leaves. Other carvings, meanwhile, were designed by MebS employees themselves – style elements inspired by hunting are trademarks of the Sierakowice workshop.
„The OF 1010 router is the perfect tool for routing. The precise setting makes it possible to reproduce the contours of shapes exactly.“
Bartlomiej Jóskowski - owner of MebS Möbel
Experience is the ultimate benchmark
Then our tour moves on to the beating heart of MebS – the joiner's workshop. This is where woods of different kinds wait to be turned into carvings or items of furniture. Woodworking is in the MebS team's blood, and you really get a sense of this walking through the workshop. "Everything comes down to the quality of the wood; you can see it in the finished products. By now, I can tell at first glance whether or not a material is suitable for our work," says Jóskowski. The main challenge becomes apparent when looking at a cutting template: The intricate motifs such as leaves and faces need to be transferred onto the wood with the utmost precision and delicacy. "The OF 1010 and OF 1400 router are the perfect tools for routing. The precise setting makes it possible to reproduce the contours of shapes exactly, which is what we need for our cutting templates," explains one of the workers. This is why the owner only employs professionals who have a wealth of previous carving experience. Wood carvers are trained to pay attention to minute detail and take great care in their work. Professional carpenters are hard to find, so Bartlomiej Jóskowski looks for staff from all over the country. This means that wood carvers from the most distant parts of Poland frequently come to work in Sierakowice. Despite the sculptors' different backgrounds, the workshop cultivates a homogeneous style. "This results in pieces of furniture that look as though they were all made by the same person," emphasises Jóskowski proudly.
Power tools for success
The next step is to prepare the individual parts of the furniture. There is no question of using industrial manufacturing techniques for this: It simply would not have the same effect as manual craftsmanship, which is why MebS only ever uses handheld power tools. "I bought my first Festool product – the OF 1010 router – nine years ago. Since then I've used it every day; it's like the perfect extension of my own hand," says Jóskowski while using the mitre saw to cut a wooden panel with millimetre precision. "The router is one of our most important tools. The routing depth is easy to set and can be adjusted to suit whatever cutting template you're using exactly. This makes creating carvings with varying routing depths a breeze." These tools are used mainly in the last and second-to-last stages of production, where the items are given their finishing touches.
Everything comes together
Once all the pieces have been cut, the furniture is assembled. Another Festool product is used to do this – the DOMINO joining machine with DOMINO dowels. "DOMINO dowels help us build strong, sturdy furniture. The wooden dowels can't be seen from the outside, so they don't alter the appearance of the carvings. They provide a firm hold and prevent twisting," says one of the joiners about putting the pieces together. DOMINO dowels can be used in two different ways – either with or without play. The MebS team always attach the dowels in cupboards and chests of drawers with a certain amount of play. This enables them to move the front part or the side panel, for example, to bring it into the correct position before gluing it in place. This technique is a traditional one, albeit one that has now been made easier thanks to today's power tools and dowels.
The soul of a long-standing tradition
"Our requirements have changed over the years. It wouldn't be possible to produce the standard of quality customers expect in the time frame they want without using modern-day hand tools. The furniture would be exorbitantly expensive," explains one of the workers in the joiner's workshop. Nevertheless, the company stands out from others on the market by refusing to use off-the-shelf computer-based solutions of any kind. The proud professional won't even hear of it: "When woodworking is done by computers, the end product is basically 'lifeless'. It loses all its character. It's proper manual workmanship that gives furniture its charm." It is for this reason that MebS's first port of call is always a carving tool or a handheld router. "Our furniture has soul. You can feel it," says one of the wood carvers at the end of our tour. It's thanks to furniture workshops like MebS that customers can still enjoy the beauty of furnishings in the old Gdańsk style today. Thoroughly impressed with their craftsmanship and unique carvings, we leave the workshop and set off for home, brimming with new understanding.
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