Wallcoverings Academy

[Chris Murphy]

Brad Bender, probably the best instructor out there, has a workshop scheduled; see attached.

[Eunice, PRS Reporter]

Has he ever been involved with the Guild?

[Bill Archibald]

He was at Portland - is that "involved" :lol:

-Bill

[Chris Murphy]

Yes, Brad was in the Guild, at the least in the late '80's and early '90's. He came to the Portland Wallcoverings 202 class, to observe and offer suggestions, per a request I made to him and the BOD. Brad was the guy with a voice uncannily like "The Godfather's." His critique hit much the same points as your "Evaluation" that you handed in, Eunice (Elsie gave me the 2 classes' evaluations). He gratefully helped out KL Conner and I in the "Table Trimming" portion: there were far too many students for us to adequately teach.
Brad was one of my instructors at the US School of Professional Paperhanging in Rutland, Vt ('79). I am not sure how long he was there, but it was years. He was easily the best instructor then, better than the owner, Stan Warshaw. Graduates of the school in the NGPP are, if not legion, noteworthy: Bob Kelly, Barry Blanchard, Phil Reinhard, Doug Kitchen, Mark White, Lyle Gehrke, Larry Duval, Heidi Johnson, Lou Schiavo, Jr. He currently teaches art in a public system in VT, and has his workshops at least once a year; he also hangs paper on school breaks.
If you peruse the workshop schedule, you'll notice heavy emphasis on working at the table, "table technique." This means having an efficient set-up along with suitable tools that allow many functions to be done on the table, as opposed to the wall: easier than hopping up and down from a ladder, for example, and much more accurate and clean. This is what those of us that went to the USSPP were taught; indeed, it is an accumulation of techniques that were used by union & 'high-end' hangers for over the last hundred years, taught as basic skills. Basic, but unknown to those that are self-taught, as some of these techniques are not generally 'discovered' by our usual experimentation that we use to get through the day.