Three digital field guides from a working restoration studio. Each one answers a question you’ll ask at every listing, estate sale and warehouse: what is it made of, what should I check, and what is it really?
For buyers, collectors and dealers who are tired of guessing — and of paying for “solid walnut” that wasn’t.
Instant access after a secure Stripe checkout, with an email after you buy. See how the guides read a listing · Need help choosing? Ask the studio.
Three digital guides, not printed booksDigital guides · Instant access · Read on phone or computer · Download and print · Yours to keep
One decision, three steps: see it, inspect it, understand it. Start with the step you are stuck on. The guides work together, and none replaces another.
Each stands alone. Together they cover the whole decision — from the listing photograph to the moment you pay.
Guide 01 · IdentifyThe Material AtlasTell what a piece is actually made of — solid, veneer or laminate, and which wood.Guide 02 · InspectThe Field KitKnow exactly what to check, photograph, measure and ask when you're standing in front of it.Guide 03 · InvestigateThe Mid-Century DetectiveWork out what the piece really is, whether it's genuine, and what it's worth to you.Every buying decision asks three questions, in this order. Each guide answers one of them. They work together, and none replaces another.
The listing says “solid walnut.” You want to read the finish, face, edge and inside for yourself, and know how sure you can be.
You are about to see a piece in person. You want a routine that covers what to check, photograph, measure and ask, without relying on memory.
You need to weigh construction, hardware, proportion, labels and wear before you trust an attribution or a price.
Buying a piece that matters? You will meet all three questions.
The Complete Buyer’s Bundle: all three guides for $97 · $113 separately, save $16.
LBD Restoration restores and sells mid-century furniture. The Field School is that same eye, written down so you can use it anywhere.
Everything in the guides is how a restorer actually reads a piece — finish, face, edge, inside — from 10+ years of hands-on furniture work.
The same checks are run on every piece before it enters the LBD collection. The guides teach you to do it yourself.
Photographs, pocket cards and step-by-step passes. Built to be used at a listing or in someone's living room, not read once and forgotten.
Before you trust the listing, read the furniture. Here is the kind of check the guides teach, in three passes you can run from the photos or in person.
Compare the grain on the edge with the grain on the top. If the edge shows a different pattern, or a thin straight band that does not carry the figure around the corner, the top is most likely veneer.
A mirrored, book-matched figure, a starburst, or burl across a large top points to veneer. Solid boards rarely line up that neatly.
Pull a drawer. Look at the back panel, the drawer bottoms and the sides. What the maker used where nobody looks tells you how the whole piece was built.
Veneer is not a flaw: plenty of fine mid-century pieces are veneered. It does change what the piece is, how you weigh the price, and how it can be restored. Good furniture leaves clues.
One buying decision, three steps: identify what it's made of, inspect it in person, and work out what a piece really is. Each guide stands alone; together they cover the whole decision.
Every guide lives in My Library: read it in the built-in reader on your phone at the piece, or download the files and print the cards. Buy once, use for good.
Digital guides are final sale. If you are not sure which guide fits your question, read the worked example above or ask the studio before you buy.
Buying does not need an account, but Photo Check does. After you buy, sign in with the email you used at checkout and open My Library once. Your guide attaches to your account, and the Photo Check tab opens for you.
Pay with Stripe. Your guide is ready the moment checkout completes, and you get an email after you buy.
A clean built-in reader for desktop and phone, with a contents drawer and your place saved.
Screen and print editions, pocket cards and field sheets — from My Library, any time, as many times as you like.
Guest checkout works. Sign in later with the same email and your guide appears in My Library, with the reader, saved progress and Photo Check.
Join the list and your code arrives instantly — good on any guide or the bundle. Then, now and again, one useful furniture lesson. Unsubscribe any time.
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