Woodworking tools are the hand tools used by carpenters, joiners, cabinetmakers, wheelwrights, coopers, turners and other woodworkers to cut, shape, join and finish timber. They include saws, planes, chisels, gouges, braces and bits, spokeshaves, drawknives, marking gauges, squares, mallets and clamps.
Before mechanisation, every woodworking trade relied on a specialised kit of hand tools, many of which were made by the craftsman himself or by local smiths. In Britain, Sheffield and Birmingham became major centres for edge tools and saws in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, while firms such as Spiers of Ayr and Norris of London became renowned for high-quality infill planes. Wooden moulding planes, beech-bodied with maker's names stamped on the toe, survive in large numbers and record a great many small makers. American manufacturers, notably Stanley, popularised cast iron planes from the later nineteenth century. Collectors look for maker's marks, original irons and fittings, sound bodies free of splits and woodworm, and a good, unrestored surface. Many old tools remain perfectly usable. Displayed together, antique tools and tool chests make evocative decoration in studies, workshops and kitchens.
