If you love woodworking done the old-fashioned way—using only hand tools—and are intrigued by the idea of “woodworking comedy,” you could do worse than spend this Labor Day weekend in the Amana Colonies.
On September 4 and 5, the venerable settlement in eastern Iowa will host Handworks 2026, a confab attracting some 80 vendors of new and vintage woodworking tools, as well as wood artists with wares to sell. Woodworking educators will be in attendance too, including Minnesotan Mike Siemsen, who’s slated to sing the national anthem and do a standup routine about the craft (“A wood chisel and a hand plane walk into a bar…,” perhaps?).
Joining vendors from the Midwest, both coasts, New England, and the South will be makers from Canada, Australia, France, and China.
If the last outing, in 2023, is anything to go by, something like 5,000 people will visit the event’s host venues, two huge old barns and one brick building in Main Amana, the second-largest of the six villages in the colony, which was established in the 19th century by radical Protestant believers from Germany. They’re totally distinct from the Amish, but shared their belief in simple living—and hand tools.
Christopher Schwarz will be there. The Covington, Kentucky–based chairmaker and founder of woodworking publisher Lost Art Press calls the event “something like a big family reunion for all of us in the business. For the attendees, it’s completely free, and that’s unheard of. In a lot of woodworking shows, you have to pay to get in, or pay to take a seminar with somebody, and for us vendors the booth fees can be $1,000 or $2,000. These booth fees are, like, 50 bucks.”
The Festhalle Barn at the Amana Colonies in Iowa will host many of the weekend's activities.
