Which magazine for a beginner?

You should check out the forum on Periodical Opionions.

-- JP, Shelbyville, KY

That’s perfect. Thanks.

-- Jerry L.

Take a serious look at fine woodworking online. When you subscribe you get access to avery issue that they have ever published. It is a great resource.

-- Hope Never fails

Two very good Magazines are “Wood” and “Fine WoodWorking”. jockmike

-- Mike. Profisher50@yahoo.com

My suggestions would be, Wood (has patterns in the magazine), ShopNotes and ShopSmith(have a lot of neat ideas and usable designs).

-- Jesus is Lord!

I personally like Wood, ShopNotes, Popular WWing, and FWW. I subscribe to those. I occasionally pick up a copy of ShopSmith or Workbench. Handyman and Family Handyman are pretty good, but their not exclusively WWing. I like their product testing program. I’ve gotten a couple of neat items to test when I subscribed to them.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

hmmm.. I guess the best “magazine” you can get for free is the subscription to the LJ Blogs Feed ;) What do you think?

-- Martin, http://lumberjocks.com | My Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/people/Martin_Sojka/1357216976

To answer your question, I like Popular Woodworking and think it has great content as well as the other’s listed. I read all of them.

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

A great magazine for a beginner is ShopNotes. They show you methods of work and teach you how to build jigs, they have good projects to build and they show you the plans and have cut lists/plans online for free, (last time I checked.)

-- John

Let’s see…. $20 for 14 copies of a magazine or a shameless promotion for Lumberjocks.com ;-). I think it’s a toss up between Popular Woodworking, ShopNotes, and the online subscription to Fine Wood Working.

Thanks everyone for your help.

-- Jerry L.

I subscribe to FWW, but I don’t do the web site because I never could get past the fact that you have to pay again to view the web site…I have always felt that subscribers to the magazine should have access to the web site. Just my .02

-- John

I agree with you there John. I wish they didn’t double dip for the online subscription. On the other hand, their online content is far more extensive than any other magazine’s site. They are definitely spending more money to maintain it than the other publications. The video content alone makes it worth it for me as that is the only kind of instruction I have access to. Shopnotes has some great free stuff on their site, though.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

Thanks, Jeff,

Your (and other’s) comments about the content may sway me regarding the FWW web site…

-- John

What about just grabbing whatever woodworking magazine on the newstand that catches your fancy. I have hundreds of woodworking magazines and have never had a subscription. Fine Woodworking is great, and many libraries have years of back issues of this publication and Wood magazine.

-- Phil Brown, Ontario

Hands down SHopnotes

While I love Shopnotes, tidewalker, it is limited in many ways. I love it because building jigs and shop fixtures is a part of WWing I really enjoy. ShopNotes focuses on shop improvement and tool accuracy. They are the best at it. Other publications have broader scopes that touch on all things WWing.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

My choices are Wood, Wood Workers Journal and Fine Wood Working in that order.

-- Woodeneye, Michigan, www.rdrouare@provide.net

WOODSMITH—-WOODSMITH— I have sub. to all the mags. Fine WW when it was black and white, same for all the others. Shopnotes are put out my woodsmith and put on mag racks. They have great plans and don’t have pages and pages of adds. Fine ww is like a lot of mags. Good to look at put don’t help new bies like me.

-- Morris Wallace Seffner Fl. www.woodwork@tampabay.rr.com

Woodsmith, Shopnotes, Wood, Finewoodworking. Woodsmith and Shopnotes are invaluable for the beginner, Wood has great plans that are very detailed, and Fine Woodworking for the occasional pearl that you just don’t get anywhere else.

Just my thoughts.

Cheers!

-- You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation. (Plato)

I subscribe to just about every mag. on the market. Wood, Fine Wood Working, Popular Woodworking, Woodworkers Journal, American Woodworker, Woodsmith, and Shop Notes. There may be one other out there, a sister mag. to Popular Woodworking. I haven’t’ subscribed to that yet because I am unsure that they will continue with it. Now back to your question, which one. That will really depend upon you and what you want from the magazine. They all run tool tests and make recommendations, some better than others. For someone looking for articles addressing a basic skills and projects, I would say Wood. As you advance, I would look to WoodSmith and ShopNotes next. Popular Woodworking, Woodworker’s Journal, and American Woodworker come next. Fine Wood Working is a little more for the experienced user but you can get a ton of information from it. I would also sign up for their website. This is probably the best ww’ing mag. site on the net. It provides years of articles on a wide range of topics. Wood mag. also has a pretty good site, but you have to pay for back issue articles. Woodworker’s Journal has a great enewsletter that you can get for free. It has some great articles in it as well as a great April 1st issue. Popular Woodworking has an outstanding series going right now about workshop design. If you can go and purchase the back issues, it is well worth the money. American Woodworker is a good mid level mag. It is published by Reader’s Digest so some people give it a bad reputation but I have found it pretty good. WoodSmith and ShopNotes are great. They provide great projects, tips, and articles about using various tools and techniques. I would recommend getting them both.
Now which one? That is a personal preference. I would recommend that you get a few off the newsstand and see which one you like best or you can be like me and just get them all : )

-- Greg - Charles Town, WV

Greg, Woodworking Magazine does not offer a subscription. I think they’ll be around for a long time. Right now, the question is whether they have enough readers to move to more issues a year (from 2 to 4 or 6) and offer subscriptions. Currently it is only for sale in book stores like Borders and B&N or off their website.

My opinion on magazines…

Don’t waste your money: Woodworker’s Journal – if you want me to rant with some details, I will…

Great if you love to follow plans: Shop Notes, Wood Magazine – they have good plans and I’ve never found any glaring errors in measurments and what have you, though I must admit I’ve actually never followed the plans out of any magazine to the letter… I always change a little something here and there if I do follow a plan.

Great if you want the knowledge and information to make your own stuff: Woodworking Magazine, Popular Woodworking, Fine Woodworking – I think these magazines do a better job of giving you woodworking knowledge via well-written articles and demonstrations and reviews. Over the past year or so, I’ve wittled my subscription down to just Popular Woodworking and Fine Woodworking and I anxiously wait for the next semi-annual issue of woodworking magazine.

-- Ethan, http://www.merganserwoodworks.com, http://greystonegreen.blogspot.com/

I”ve tried grabbing mags off the newstand that catch my fancy… and if I find myself buying 2 or 3, I’ll spring for the years subscription, which is cheaper by far.

of course, we can put in several hours of work (equivalent to hundreds, if not thosands of dollars in manhours… and get a free year of Pop Wood, just for making and posting our G&G tables.

I am about to spring for the online FWW… sure it may seem like they are double dipping, but they are really providing more and quality content that they just cant jam into the magazine. Other mags sites are decades old by comparison, if not an afterthought.

-- I am always doing what I cannot do yet, in order to learn how to do it. - Pablo Picasso -- http://snbcreative.wordpress.com/