Lettercarving In Wood is the first comprehensive guide to the craft to be published in a single volume. It is essential reading for all carvers interested in expanding their lettercarving skills. Beginning with essential background information - tools, suitable woods, making working drawings - the author then moves on to detailed exercises showing how to carve a complete incised alphabet in the modern roman letter style. A similar approach is used to demonstrate how to carve modern roman in raised letters.

More advanced aspects of the subject are included, such as spacing, colour, family resemblance and optical adjustment. To help you develop your technique in a practical way, six other letter styles are fully explained and illustrated, and there are nine step-by-step projects, including simple signs and decorative lettering on a bowl and a breadboard.

Groundwork: Background - Setting up - The process of lettercarving
Incised Lettering: About incised lettering - Incised lettering exercises Characteristics of individual letters in modern roman
Raised Lettering: About raised lettering - Raised lettering exercises
Letterform: Layout - Letterstyles
Projects: Incised lettering projects - Raised lettering projects

Chris Pye has been a professional woodcarver for than 25 years and is a member of the Master Carvers Association. His work is done mainly to commission, with clients including HRH the Prince of Wales. It ranges from architectural moldings to figure carving, furniture to lettering, bedheads and fireplaces. He has also written extensively about woodcarving for several magazines.