Who to Call for Custom Furniture in San Diego: a Carpenter, a Woodworker, or a Cabinet Maker?

When people call or contact us with a project for their San Diego home, they ask for a lot of different things. Some people will call looking for a “carpenter,” while others will send us an email asking if we do “woodworking” or “cabinetry.” Some will simply ask if we are a “custom furniture maker.”

Not every San Diego homeowner knows exactly what type of professional they need, and that’s okay! They know what they want built in their home—a custom table, a built-in entertainment center, or new kitchen cabinets—but when they go to search online for someone to make it, they get stuck. Do they search for a carpenter? A woodworker? A cabinet maker? A custom furniture maker? Or something else altogether?

There is a lot of crossover in the various professions that deal with building things out of wood, and some of these titles are more or less interchangeable, but we wanted to clear things up a bit in this post for those who want a better understanding of what types of things each type of professional builds, and what type of person they should be searching for based on their needs.

Carpenters

Typically, a carpenter is a skilled tradesman who works on a construction site on large-scale projects. A carpenter would build the framing for a new house or a home addition. They also often complete other construction tasks like installing doors and windows. For an existing house, you would call a carpenter for things like repairing a deck or wood patio cover (or building a simple one), changing out doors, fixing stair treads, or adding shelving to an existing closet. In other words, you would call a carpenter for jobs that don’t require a lot of fine detail work.

If you need more detailed work done around your house, you could call a finish carpenter. A finish carpenter could handle tasks like installing crown molding, wainscotting, baseboards, window casings, or new stair railings. A finish carpenter could also be used to install ready-to-assemble (RTA) cabinets in your home.

Woodworkers

In contrast to carpenters who largely work onsite, woodworkers do most of their work in their own shops, where they have a variety of hand and power tools, depending on the type of items they build.

A woodworker will typically work with finer wood products than carpenters and will have an understanding of the different species of wood and how they should be used. They can often incorporate products other than just wood into their work, such as veneers, laminates, glass, or metal. A woodworker will also need to know how to use various finishing processes, such as sanding, staining, painting, sealing, and varnishing.

San Diego custom furniture makers and custom cabinet builders would fall under the category of “woodworkers.”

Woodworking tends to have more of a creative aspect to it than carpentry. There are finer details involved, and many woodworkers would consider themselves artists.

While there are many people who do woodworking solely as a hobby, there are professional woodworkers in San Diego, like Three Pines Wood Co., who take on custom projects for customers. A professional woodworker can take an idea and turn it into a finished piece, like a custom table, cabinet, or bedroom set.

Contact Three Pines for Custom Furniture and Woodworking in San Diego

Now that you have a better understanding of the type of professional you are looking for, contact us at Three Pines Wood Co. if you could use the skills of a professional woodworking company like us. Whether you need custom furniture or custom cabinets for your San Diego home, we can help! We offer free local delivery, and the design of your piece is also included.