NEW GLOUCESTER — Wood has something in common with living things — you need to leave room for it.

It’s one of the early lessons New Gloucester’s master furniture maker Chris Becksvoort learned and took to heart.

“In high school, I built a little plant table for my mom,” he said. “It was about two feet square and it was glued, screwed and tattooed all around and she stuck it over a hot air vent. And within two weeks, it split right down the middle.”

He took the table back to his instructor and asked what went wrong.

“He said, ‘you didn’t let the wood move,'” Becksvoort said. “And he didn’t say anything else. It wasn’t until I got to Orono and had a semester in wood technology that I actually figured out how this stuff all worked.”

Wood expands and shrinks in a single direction as it absorbs water or dries out. A craftsman takes that expansion into account, laying a board with the grain going in one direction on part of a piece, another direction in another part. Nails, pins and pegs designed to hold a piece of furniture together are not made to fit into tight circles, but wide ovals that allow the wood to ebb and flow and the piece becomes a kind of organic creation with a life of its own.

It’s making something that’s going to last, as opposed to just making something.

“The difference between an antique and a piece of junk is that the antique was built right in the first place,” Becksvoort said.

Becksvoort may be one of the most recognizable names in the world of fine furniture and woodworking, especially among aficionados of Shaker designs. He’s written several books on the topic and is a contributing editor to national magazine Fine Woodworking.

He’s considered an expert internationally, sought for his knowledge on the topic as much as his skill as a craftsman.

He makes beautiful bookcases, cabinets, desks, chairs, tables and wall pieces. He’s made music stands and stage accouterments for classical violinist Yo Yo Ma and for blues rock band the Cowboy Junkies and has even appeared on NBC-TV sitcom “Parks and Recreation.”

“But people in New Gloucester don’t have a clue who I am,” he said. “I have more pieces in Japan than I do in New Gloucester. Here, they’re just like, ‘Oh, he makes furniture.’ But that’s just fine with me.”

Becksvoort didn’t have much interest in working as a carpenter as a youth. He learned the basics from his father, Henry, a working carpenter, but studied forestry and wildlife in college.

“I worked at a fish and wildlife center in Maryland for a year and I discovered that making sawdust for a living wasn’t all that bad,” he said.

He became interested in Shaker designs while at college — it was very similar to the Danish modern furniture his father favored — and approached the Shakers still living at Sabbath Day Lake.

“I asked them if they had anything I could fix or repair,” he said. “That’s how I got started doing work over there.”

He teaches classes at Sabatthday Lake and still helps explore and repair pieces there. It’s given him a firsthand opportunity to examine the simple furniture and incorporate some of the design solutions into his own work.

“As far as I know, there were no plans or dimensions to any of the pieces I’ve seen and I’ve done a lot of research,” he said. “It was all done by word-of-mouth. Basically, they took the New England styles and just pared it down. They made it simpler, got rid of the Gingerbread, kept it clean and made it functional.”

It’s one of the things Becksvoort’s clients like about his work.

“I’ve delivered pieces to a chrome-and-glass condo in New York and it fit right in,” he said. “A Queen Anne piece would have looked out of place. Because it’s simple and unadorned, it tends to have a timeless simplicity.”

Do you know a creative person with a technological bent? We’d love to talk to them. Contact Staff Writer Scott Taylor at [email protected], on Twitter as Orange_me or call 207-689-2846.