About me: Jeremy Crytzer
I am indebted to the great lineage of master woodworkers who have gone before me, including my father and grandfather, but of particular influence on my style and philosophy is the modern furniture maker, James Krenov. This is first and foremost because his work and his artistic soul were inseparably fused, and represent the true dedication of the artist without regard to the mundane and manipulative demands of "the market." But it is also because the lines of his designs, their elegance and simplicity, and his finesse with joinery, provide me with inspiration and inform my techniques to the core. He refused to regard trees and the desires inherent in wood as anything less than sacred.
In his own words: "Without a certain attitude to our craft, information itself is of little value. It is what we do with what we know that matters, finally: not only the results, but also the doing itself. After all, that is what we are left with, after the piece is done and has found its owner and we are back working again. What some of us find is an enjoyment we can't weigh against money, recognition, or artistic aura. By whatever term others call it, it is the feeling of doing something we want to do- and doing it well, by measures both honest and sensitive."
I must also mention the Shakers who anonymously have left us some of the finest woodworking in the world. Their sensibility was the pinnacle of form meets function.
I began my career as a carpenter in 1986. During my house building years in New England where I grew up, I worked on many historical reproductions of traditional English timberframes. I also worked on several houses on the historical register of the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities, including the restoration of the Jethro Coffin house, the oldest house on Nantucket. I also worked on the construction of many contemporary homes.
In the past few years I have shifted my focus toward custom kitchens, fine woodworking, and custom furniture making, in addition to the renovations & remodeling which I have been doing for many years. My clientele is mainly from the Ithaca, New York area, but I do accept commissions from anywhere in the United States, Canada and Switzerland.