“Fatigue is the best pillow.”

 ~Benjamin Franklin

Gabardi & Son is a family owned and managed business.  It was unofficially started in the early 1970’s.  The work has ebbed and flowed through the shop for nearly 40 years.  We have focused our efforts in many directions before setting our sights on making custom infill planes.  Today our goal is to create handplanes that function as high end handtools and encompass all of the passion and beauty of a work of art.  In a word; Perfect!

Below is a brief family history.  It has little to do with how we build planes, rather it explains how we approach work and life at Gabardi & Son.

 

It started with two Italian brothers and the promise of America

In 1924 the two Gabardi brothers, Angelo & Giovanni emigrated to the United States from Northern Italy.  The promise of a better life is all they needed to move half way around the world.  They settled in Utah.  The brothers where very resourceful and built a beautiful life for themselves and their families.  They started by planting a large apple orchard in Salt Lake City.  They were both masons, and in their orchard, they built a stone house that looked more like a castle.  The brothers where craftsmen and artists in the true sense.  They had build beautiful churches back in Italy and that is what they judged their work against.  I visited a house that they had done the plaster (after the lath was set) work in.  The walls looked sculpted.  They had been so proud of the work that above the master bedroom door they had carved their names in the plaster.

The brothers lived hard lives by a rigid set of beliefs and ethics.  This way of living life was passed down to my father and then to me.  Most of life is black and white, right and wrong, with very little grey.  Always do your best!  Family comes first, period.  And in the end of life you are judged by what you have given to others not what you have taken.  It is very hard to live this simple way of life, but it has great rewards.

 

Gabardi’s Story

After graduating from high school, my dad (the Gabardi in Gabardi & Son Toolworks) left home for Europe.  He spend 3 years living in Italy and Switzerland.  When he came home he married his high school sweetheart, Karen Sue VanSeters, and started a family.  (Like my dad, my mom is also a child of emigrants.  Her family moved from Holland in 1906.) 

He worked in many industries before settling into an apprenticeship in a cabinetmakers shop.  He worked his way up through the ranks until he was the foreman.  Being the boss was short lived.  Dad’s heart was in creating the finest cabinets and furniture that he could, not in checking others work.  He had also learned that most people only do what they have to, which is a far cry from his core belief of always doing your best.

He stayed at the same shop as a journeyman cabinetmaker for many years.  During that time he was learning how to master his art.  His teachers were the “old Germans”.  I remember these men as short, stout, grey haired, smelling of pipe tobacco and always smiling.  They had both started working in a cabinet shops back in the “old world” as boys.  They loved working with hand tools because they had perfected their use many years ago.  That made the “old Germans” the perfect mentors for my dad to study under.

He left the cabinet shop in the late 70’s because the work model had changed.  The Germans were gone by then and he was the last of the true craftsmen employed.  The shop, like most, had learned that speed not quality earned them profits.  People had been replaced by faster machinery.  The art was gone, he was simply a production line worker. 

The first Gabardi company was a two man, custom cabinet shop.  It was in our basement.  These were some of my happiest days with my dad.  After school I would hurry home so that I could work with him in the shop.  His standards where high.  There was no excuse for rushing a project and doing less than my best work.  During  these years I decided what kind of man I wanted to become.  Like all young boys, I wanted to become like my dad.  (My memories from these few years are the reason that the Legacy Guild matters to me.  Every boy should be that lucky!)

Dad’s cabinet shop struggled for a few years before he had to let his one employee go.  Hand made or machine made, most consumers don't care as much as they care how much it costs.  The Gabardi Cabinet shop started making and testing new ideas of how an artist could make a living working with wood.  We made puzzles, wooden bodied planes, jewelry boxes, musical instruments from guitars to recorders, and much more.

He made a foot powered lathe, learned to smith his own cutting tools and heat treat the cutting edges.  And he made planes of all shapes and sizes.

Dad loved handtools.  He wanted to know what makes them work. 

Dad passed away in January 2003.  I miss him!

The Son’s Story

I made my first plane when I was 12 years old.  Dad told me that if I made it I would understand how it worked and be able to use it better.  It was a small block plane with a blade made from a piece of a file that had been ground flat and hardened.  It worked great and I still use it today.

After college I started work for Marriott as a Sales and Marketing Manager.  I married the sweetest girl, Kim, and started my family.  After 10 years of marriage we have lived on both coasts and had three children;  Sidni, Ethan, and Colby.  We had the world by the horns.  We owned 5 acres of wine country land in California that we were working on planting with Petite Sarah vines and I had a great job with Marriott.  Like a lot of people  September 11th shook our world.  We sat and watched the buildings fall in horror because Kim and the kids had flown on Delta flight 11 weeks earlier coming home from Boston after spending the summer at a family house in Vermont. 

The long hours and longer commutes had to end.  Time as a family was more important than chasing a career.  We took a layoff package and moved home to Utah.  I started making and selling classical guitars.  Like the planes that I make today, my guitars were made one at a time, by hand using handtools.  Using handplanes daily gave me a respect for a well made tool. 

Making guitars is slow going.  In the last year I spent as much time making tools and jigs for the shop as guitars.  Today I have a shop that is steeped in the art of the luthier, and a handtool woodworkers dream.  At the end of the day the floor is covered in shavings and dust, my arms are sore, but because I use handtools I can still hear the music in the background. 

It takes all of my skills, focus, and energy to create a plane that wears the Gabardi & Son name.  I am an artist.  My medium is metal and wood.  When you hold a plane with perfect balance, perfect workmanship, a beautiful shape and form, an amazing infill, and a flawless finish, you will be inspired!  Inspiring your work is my ultimate goal.

~Matt

© 2009 Gabardi & Son

 

My 1st plane, made in 1982 out of a fir 2x4 and an old file.