He can tell, at a glance, whether something was made with care, it is the whole reason he does this. Which is exactly why the shirts made for him are so insulting: another pun, another default font, another joke about sawdust. This one is a nineteenth-century trade-catalogue plate. A bench chisel laid across the chest, every bevel and ferrule band engraved in fine linework, one long shaving curling away beneath the blade, the ribbon that only a properly honed edge will give you. Beneath it, the oldest instruction in the craft: KEEP IT SHARP. Under a hairline rule, the specimen caption: FIG. 9, THE BENCH CHISEL.
Soft and easygoing, broken in from the first wear, with engraving that sits in the fabric rather than on top of it, offered in a range of deep, shop-dark shades chosen so the warm ink reads rich.
It is the piece a partner or a daughter can hand over at Christmas knowing it will land: admiring, never sentimental, and impossible to mistake for a gag gift.
Made for the maker, not for the joke about him.
