Comments on 3 leg stool from The Anarchist’s Design Book by Christopher Schwarz

 Comments on 3 leg stool from The Anarchist’s Design Book by Christopher Schwarz.

Stool build photos and commentary by Andrew Willis, July 6, 2026

 

About six years ago I built the 3-leg stool shown below on the left. The original stool is called a High Staked Stool from chapter 7. On the right is a 4-leg rectangular stool that I built to replace the 3-leg stool. The new stool was finished this past 4^th of July weekend. Stools are shown surrounding my kitchen island.

Having built a replacement, the 3-leg stool has been retired and will be donated to a yard sale fundraiser. Here is why I built a replacement.

·        The 3-leg stool was unstable and was knocked over many times in comparison to the ordinary round top store bought 4 leg stools shown in this picture. So the stool was generally not trusted and largely avoided by the family to avoid injury.

·        The stool top was slanted back 1” as recommended by the book. Christopher said that he thought it looked good and wasn’t bothered by the back slant, but my family disagreed. Also, someone sitting in it for the first time was startled as they didn’t expect anything other than level.

·        As I built it, the back leg was sticking out 4” beyond the seat so that it was often accidentally knocked by people walking past and the stool would fall over. My target on the new stool was to only have about 1” of the leg beyond the edge of the seat to reduce this issue. Note the legs should have as much spread as possible to not tip over.

·        I had originally built two of the 3 leg stools. During use, one of the legs broke at the 5/8” hole connection point for the footrest, as shown in the picture below. I had originally tapered the legs some, which probably reduced the leg thickness at that joint by 1/8”. So, this time I left the legs a full 1 ½” thick all the way down. In examining the break, it appears to have been all good wood without any sign of a knot. One of my daughters was leaning back on the stool on two legs when it broke.

 

Something that I appreciated about the stool design is the wide top. This large top is much more comfortable than the typical 13” diameter round top stools shown in the first picture. Also, with this width, it is easy to get both feet on the footrest.

Note that for the new one, I didn’t connect the front and back footrests with a spreader, as that didn’t seem needed and would only weaken the footrest by drilling a hole through the middle.

I used liquid hide

 

Here are the dimensions that I used to build the 4 leg stool.

Note that you can personalize the footrest location. I made one stool at 15” that seems to be perfect for a couple of my daughters that are 5’-5” tall. I am 5’-10” tall and feel it is a little high. 17” is typically recommended, and so I made a second stool at 17” and feel that is near perfect for me. 16” might be a good compromise.

 

Materials:

I got a local Amish sawmill to cut me a few rough 2” x 12” green Poplar boards that I used for the top. I also had a couple oak logs from a tree I cut down, and so I cut a couple 2” thick rough cut boards from that for the legs. In the book, Chris mentioned using a green Poplar top with dried oak legs. I tried that and ended up with the top drying out and both splitting some at the ends and bowing up about 1/8” to ¼”. Further, all the legs loosened, and I had to reglue them. Further, the legs no longer sat square on the floor and had to be recut. Likely my oak legs were not dry. So, for the rest of the stools, I rough cut all the lumber and let them dry in the house for a few months before restarting the project. Also, I sealed all the rough-cut ends to reduce splitting during the drying process. Most of the rough ends I sealed with water-soluble wax that I have heard being used for green bowls or other woods that need to dry slowly. I also finished the tops with linseed oil immediately after jointing, planning, and cutting them to size to keep them from splitting if they were going to dry further.

 

The picture below shows a couple of tools that I used to cut the 6-degree taper hole in the seat.

The top left item is a drill press table surface set at 11 degrees. The leg resultant is 11 degrees.

The 6 degree taper reamer (shown bottom right) took 3 degrees off that so I could line up the edge of the reamer with the edge of an 8 degree guide block to better keep in alignment. I also liked that my sight line was an easy 45 degrees to the corner of the seat.

This 6 degree reamer has an old piece of bandsaw blade cut to shape and sharpened.