The Frustrating Truth About Most Woodworking Plans — And How Ted McGrath Fixed It
For over two decades, Ted McGrath watched talented, enthusiastic woodworkers — beginners and seasoned hobbyists alike — struggle with the same heartbreaking problem: bad plans.
Plans that looked perfect on paper but contained missing measurements. Diagrams that skipped critical steps. Cutting lists that wasted hundreds of dollars in expensive hardwood. Instructions so vague that even experienced builders ended up with crooked joints, unstable furniture, and piles of ruined lumber.
Ted knew the industry was broken. Most plans sold online were never actually built by the people who drew them. They were theoretical — designed on a computer screen, never tested in a real workshop with real tools and real wood. The result? Frustration, wasted time, and projects that ended up in the scrap pile.
So Ted decided to do something radical. He assembled a team of skilled woodworkers, designers, and craftsmen and set out to create the most comprehensive, rigorously tested woodworking plan library ever assembled. Every single plan would be built, photographed, measured, and verified before it ever reached a customer's hands.
The result is TedsWoodworking — a collection of over 16,000 plans that have been shop-tested, refined, and rewritten from real builds. These aren't theoretical drawings. They're battle-tested blueprints that work every single time, whether you're working in a spacious garage or a tiny 7×8-foot workshop corner.
Ted's philosophy is simple: "If a plan doesn't work perfectly in a real shop with basic tools, it doesn't go in the library."
