Federal Style Patterns

Pick up a copy of Federal Style Patterns 1780-1820 (MaryBeth Mudrick and Lawrence D. Smith, John Wiley & Sons), flip through the pages of this elegant book, and feast your eyes on the unbelievably detailed drawings. You would naturally conclude that this book was produced by architects with a lifetime of experience in design, drafting and using CAD programs. In fact, Mudrick and Smith began as novices at all three fields.

Lawrence Smith is a cabinetmaker who fell in love with the American Federal Style while touring a historic house in Savannah. He then began collecting design details and got the crazy notion of putting together a book, the first in 200 years of Federal Style design details. MaryBeth Mudrick was in restaurant management and together they started working on the book idea. Neither had any experience with drafting, with drawing on a computer or publishing a book, but what difference does that make?

This is the story of how it all happened.