random notes

[woodcarving]

→ this amazing tumblr post by trustlup, which i'm copying here because tumblr is a shittrench:

so some fun facts about working in carpentry (from someone in the field) that probably no one wants but could be fun for writing about julia and mags with:

it is so so important to maintain a positive relationship with your clients and that’s probably why mags is so proud of his rustic hospitality and wants to use it at every corner because your relationships and reputation is half the job

for one you get returning clients and tends to be the best and most reliable source of income and you also usually will end up getting gifts from them too which is, sweet,
if they’re doing pretty well off during a year i’m almost certain that they offer discounts for their services for the poorer members of raven’s roost, mangus in particular has a “doggy discount” that if they own a dog and they let it work with him they get a good discount

both of them (+plus stephen) are probably ambidextrous to a degree as when working on repeat projects, you tend to get really tired and sore and continue working until that arm gives out and then switch to the other to be able to continue working

going with that, you get paid by commission or project usually and so hypothetically you could pick up as many as possible (or as many as the union will allow) and probably will do that a couple times and you could literally blow out your entire body but be set for the year in a couple weeks

going with the stress on the body, the physical labor definitely means that they have bad knees and probably a bad arm as well not to mention if there is a lot of heavy lifting you can get multiple hairpin fractures along your spine and legs causing intense pain that cannot be treated

also if they’re working with saws (which i’m pretty sure trav did say were in the pocket workshop) then i have no idea why mags reacted so badly to losing a finger because everyone i have ever worked with has or has almost cut off their finger once a week

also you get a very high tolerance for pain (which probably helps mags as being a sword for hirer) like i have literally sliced my entire forearm open and just wrapped it up and continued working
since raven’s roost has a carpentry district, that most likely means that they have a lumber sister town that provides all of the resources

and again, going with the importance of rustic hospitality, if you’re friends with the lumber providers then you will get first pick on the quality wood and quality literally will save you days of work

if there’s a bad harvest one year then it will fucking suck because people don’t stop needing furniture or buildings and you as the carpenter have to pick up the slack for the shitty warped wood and most projects will take about double the time

woodworking is a skill trade and has to be learned over years so most likely by the time mags came along julia was already extremely skilled and is able to do commissions and bids on her own and has her own reputation in ravens roost (which…tbh mags could have very well apprenticed under her)

it is extremely hard to go from apprenticing one carpenter to another because even the basics get muddled with your own style to the point where most people measure in different ways and cutting something wrong (especially cutting it short) will waste so much material thus mags being brand new to apprenticing under stephen probably takes years while jules just laughs each time he fucks up a leg of a chair

→Transcribed interview with Travis about Magnus