Historic Restoration Woodworker

Full-Time (35-40 hrs.)

We are looking for a skilled woodworker with 2-7 years experience and a genuine appreciation for historic architectural restoration to join our company. The right person will have woodworking competency (as described below) and be eager to develop your potential in a restoration context. You have skills and experience with both hand and machine tools and take satisfaction in doing precise and beautiful, detail-oriented work. You have an artisanal orientation, meaning your approach integrates structural soundness and functional ease with aesthetic richness. Experience in restoration work is a plus, but we will train you. Strong communication skills and work ethic (defined as honesty and industriousness), as well as a commitment to respectful collegial relations, are essential.

About Us

We are a small, but growing Chicago-area shop specializing in the restoration and period-appropriate enhancement of transitional (windows and doors) and interior elements in historic residential architecture. As our 5-star Google reviews attest (please read), we have built a strong reputation for doing high quality work with integrity and care in a relational approach with our clients.  While wood window and door restoration have been our “bread-and-butter” services, the launch of our new website is expressive of our initiative to expand our scope to take on a broader range of projects, especially ones with a strong orientation towards aesthetic enhancement. You will be part of an exciting and adventurous expansion! While profit is important, we are also a mission-driven company, recognizing that beauty in one’s everyday life is important for the soul’s well-being.  Respectful and creative commitment to three fundamental principles guides our work:

  • Preservation and enhancement of architectural integrity.
  • Integration of structural soundness and functional ease with beauty.
  • Celebration of the desirable effects of aging.

We prefer work in the residential sector (though not exclusively) because homeowners care deeply about their dwelling places.    

Key Responsibilities

  • Assess, repair, and restore historic wood windows including sash, frames, sills, muntins, and glazing components.  
  • Repair and restore historic wood doors, thresholds, casing, and associated hardware.
  • Fabricate replacement components to match existing profiles using both machine and hand tools.
  • Repair and restore other interior architectural elements, including built-in cabinets, fireplace surrounds, staircases, wood trim, pillars, wall paneling, and other interior elements.  
  • Understand and have the capacity to make scarf repairs, replacement pieces, re-build wood joints (including mortise-and-tenon joints) and both repair and replace wood veneer.
  • Apply appropriate wood consolidates, fillers, adhesives, bleaches, and finishes in a workmanlike manner.
  • Maintain consistency, quality, and economy while doing repetitive procedures over an extended period.
  • Prep. and apply painted, stained, and clear finishes.
  • Transport tools and materials to and from job sites; maintain a clean and organized work environment
  • Communicate clearly and respectfully with the owner, co-workers, and with clients on site.
  • Handle and store tools and equipment with care. 
  • Develop an understanding of and have a willingness to follow personal protection procedures and wear protective equipment when working with toxic chemicals and other hazardous materials (such as lead paint). 
  • Maintain a commitment to building your own skills in and understanding of preservation and restoration, recognizing that increased capacity not only enhances self-worth but also results in increased compensation.

Required Skills & Qualifications

  • 2–7 years of experience in carpentry, woodworking, furniture restoration, or a closely related trade in which the following skills and abilities have been acquired.
  • Safe, and efficient facility with hand tools: chisels, hand planes, mallets, hand saws, cabinet scrapers, marking tools, and the like.  Ability to sharpen and maintain hand tools.  
  • Safe, and efficient facility with shop machinery: table saw, miter saw, router (freehand and table), planer and jointer, belt sander, scroll saw, and bandsaw.
  • Ability to creatively combine router bits and use table saw to reproduce short runs of vintage profiles.
  • Ability to take accurate measurements and work to reasonable tolerances.
  • Ability to diagnose repair and restoration repair issues and develop procedures and schedules for resolving them.
  • Basic understanding of wood species, grain behavior, and joinery.
  • Reliability, punctuality, and ability to work both independently and in coordination with other crafts persons.
  • Rather than mindless engagement in tasks, the ability and initiative to think creatively about ways to restore and enhance elements in period context.
  • An attitude and ability to integrate structural soundness and functional ease with aesthetic richness.  For instance, you understand that a well-restored window is not just operational but beautiful, and that these qualities are inseparable.
  • Independent means of transportation and the ability to sustain reliable daily commute to both the shop in the South Shore neighborhood and to job sites across the metro area is essential and non-negotiable — please assess this honestly before applying.
  • Provide and maintain own hand tools.  (Some specialty tools will be provided.)
  • Ability to work discreetly onsite, understanding you are privileged to be invited into client’s homes.

Strongly Preferred Qualifications

  • Experience with historic window or door restoration.
  • Experience working in preservation and restoration contexts.
  • Any formal trade training, apprenticeship, or vocational education in woodworking.
  • Facility in the use of spray equipment for application of clear and painted finishes.
  • Ability to mix colors to create custom wood stain formulas.

What We Offer

  • Competitive hourly wage commensurate with experience.
  • A small, focused community of crafts persons where your work is visible and valued.
  • Five paid holidays.
  • Sick leave in keeping with Chicago ordinance.
  • Opportunity to develop skills in historic restoration (with partial financial support for some training courses).
  • Room for increased responsibility and compensation as your skills and our project scope expand.
  • Involvement in projects from beginning to end, resulting in satisfaction at a job well done, oftentimes on one-of-a-kind elements.
  • Direct work with appreciative clientele.

Compensation

$24-$34 per hour.  Depending on experience and skill level. This reflects the current scope and scale of our work, and we are transparent about that. As the company grows into more complex and refined restoration projects, compensation will grow with it.

To Apply

Submit a resume, portfolio, and cover letter.   

To receive consideration for this position, you must submit all three documents-a resume, a cover letter, and an informal portfolio. No exceptions!!! Send all materials to Jeff at jediger@oakbrothers.net. For the subject heading, write this: Restoration Woodworker Application

 

About Your Resume

It should include a chronological history of both work experience and education, beginning with high school graduation.  Depending on your age, even summer jobs in high school are important.  Why?  Because your ability to hold down a job is important to us!   Be prepared to explain gaps in work history.

 

About Your Cover Letter

Relax! We understand you may not be a wordsmith. We’re more concerned about your thought processes and hand skills than your eloquence. The best cover letters will reflect thoughtful consideration of our website and how your skills and values correspond to ours. Here are two prompts for ways you might approach composing this letter:

#1. Choose a project we describe on our website and talk about why it caught your interest. Describe skills you have and how they might have proved useful in completing this project if you had been involved in the process. And keep our motto in mind. “We restore things better than they used to be.” Drawing upon your unique skill set, what might you have been able to contribute to this project that might have enhanced it. Your enhancement does not have to abide by the standard we hold out for ourselves–that the enhancement is consistent with historic period context.  We’re more concerned, at this point, with your creativity and aesthetic judgment rather than your understanding of architectural history.

 

#2. Tell us what inspires you about the prospect of working in an architectural restoration context. What experience do you have that contributes to this inspiration? What skills do you possess that you believe would be particularly useful in this context. Of course, show us what you’ve done that demonstrates your competency rather than just telling us you have the skill. For instance, instead of telling us you have a capacity to pay attention to detail, describe a project you have been involved in that demonstrates your competency.

 

About Your Portfolio

We’re not looking for anything fancy. Imperfect pictures taken with your phone are fine. What IS important, though, is that your pictures show what you have done AND that you also include descriptions. (We often don’t know what we are seeing in a picture.  You have to tell us what to look for.) Tell us what you did, including challenges you faced and how you resolved them. Tell us what skills you used to complete the project. Note that the projects you show to us don’t have to be in any particular medium. And they don’t have to be restoration projects. What we want to learn is how well you work with your hands. Of course, if you’ve restored anything–a bicycle, a bookshelf, a plant that was about to die but you brought it back to life–by all means, describe your process and show us what you did. Before and after pictures are great…but believe me, we know how hard it can be to remember to get that before pictures!

And if you are better at talking than writing, it is fine to send us a video or a voice recording to accompany your pictures.

 

Fretting About Your Weakness?

Maybe your resume is weak. Compensate for it by sending a kick-ass cover letter and portfolio. Maybe your writing skills are not your forte. Compensate for it by putting extra attention into your portfolio. 

Send all these materials to Jeff at jediger@oakbrothers.net.

For the subject heading, type “Restoration Woodworker Application.”

Thanks! We’re looking forward to hearing from you and seeing what you’ve been doing with your “one wild and precious life.”  (Mary Oliver)