Cabinet base design (1)...

The other option of wood for the cabinet base is European beech from the same slabs I used to build the cabinet itself. This would provide a uniform color between the cabinet and base. I need to weigh this uniformity vs. the contrasting wood and color of a mahogany base. Since there is a client involved in this commission, the best thing for me to is defer the decision to the client. In the meantime, I have possibly found just the right slab of beech to be able to accomplish the build of the cabinet base. The cabinet base will be composed of four aprons and four legs. I have a slab of European beech with possibly enough wood to cover these eight components. Another option I have is to have the cabinet floating above the base, this would involve two more components.

In the photo, the beech slab is marked at one end with the divisions of the different components along with a small percentage of waste and dressing for each component. If the decision is made for the beech, this will be somewhat of a challenge for me. There is little margin or error when slicing this slab, with almost no wood to make spare pieces. Forgot to mention, this is the last of the European beech I have in my studio, and would need to source some more if I need it. It is not readily available in my area. Since I love challenges, I'm looking forward to this if the client decides on a beech base.

To be continued...

Cabinet base design...

I'm picking up where I left off on the beech cabinet I began a few weeks ago. The cabinet itself is fairly complete except for three dovetailed drawers. I will build the drawers only after having decided on the type of wood to use for the cabinet base. The reason I am doing this is to bring some of the color from the cabinet base up to the cabinet itself. The very first step in this process is to select the type and color of wood to use for the base. I have the option of either making the base of the same wood (European beech) as the cabinet itself, or selecting a contrasting wood instead. If contrasting, how much variation in the color and grain pattern also.

I've been mulling over this for a few days now as I complete some smaller items in my studio. It is not a simple decision as it can affect the complete aesthetics of the piece. I need to consider if the eyes are going to be drawn away from the upper cabinet and how much so. I also need to design the cabinet and base to be in harmony with each other. I have the actual design in mind, the stumbling block now is the color and which wood to use for the base.

In the photo, I have a fairly large plank of mahogany I have kept for quite a while now. The plank is rift-sawn and has ribbons of color in it, although subtle. Using this wood would provide the base with a reddish-brown color once the patina of the wood has developed completely. This is something that should always be considered when selecting woods for a piece of furniture. after a number of months or years, what color will the wood finally attain. It is important when using two colors or tones of wood, as the initial contrast might either become subdued or more pronounced over time.

This is one option I have, to use this plank for the base components. I should decide in the next few days however...

Perspective on design (1)...

I sometimes ask myself, what constitutes good design. Is it the aesthetics of the piece, the pleasing proportions, the balance of form and function... or all these characteristics combined? Taking a step back, the aesthetics and pleasing proportions are definitely at the forefront. I'm usually drawn to a piece of furniture that stands out with respect to the "look" of the piece. This one characteristic causes me to stop and further examine the piece by trying to understand what has drawn me to this particular design over another design on the same page. This analysis helps me in my own design process as I better understand what characteristics of a piece of furniture I am drawn to. Of course, we all have different styles of furniture that we are drawn to, but the common theme is good design. I am convinced that even an admirer of period styles of furniture will stop at a well-designed modern piece of furniture to further analyze it.

We've all heard the saying that everything has already been discovered or invented. I have even heard of this saying applied to furniture design. After all, we're re-shaping the same objects over and over... adding curves, changing proportions, adding ornamentation, removing the ornamentation, using darker or lighter woods, utilizing curves, replacing curves with straight lines, utilizing thicker or thinner components, etc. It is easy to come to this conclusion, however, I regularly see new pieces of furniture that make me sit back and say "wow, that is an interesting design".. or "that is a cool design, I wonder if it's been done before". In light of this, I think the boundaries of design are limitless, one just needs to think outside the box. Also, I feel that often using pre-existing styles as templates for a new design sometimes handicaps the designer , the designer subconsciously has the existing style in mind and cannot get past it. Sometimes it is better to begin with a clean slate, in our case, a pad and pencil and begin to sketch without any existing furniture designs to influence our design. All for now...

Perspective on design...

This is a previous post, but I never did continue the discourse. I find it fascinating how furniture design has evolved over the centuries. If we go back to the middle ages and the era before, quite a few developments in furniture construction techniques were in progress. Prior to this era, in the centuries before, very little furniture was available, it was considered a luxury to have chairs, tables and cabinets. The larger, more finely made furniture of this era was typically destined for the aristocracy of the time as a display of their wealth and status.

Most conventional furniture of these early periods was assembled without consideration to wood expansion and contraction or wood movement. This worked for many years, since the interior of buildings in this era was often at the same temperature as the exterior. With the advent of heated interiors, wood movement became much more of a factor to deal with in construction and design of furniture, and the practice of simply assembling wood planks together to form furniture needed to evolve. It was in the middle ages that frame and panel construction was adopted. This technique allowed a solid wood panel to literally float within a wood frame composed of rails and stiles. The solid wood panel could expand and contract on a seasonal basis, and not cause any structural failure within the furniture.

All of a sudden many more possibilities were created for furniture design and its widespread appeal began in earnest. Furniture also began to become more affordable as of the 18th and 19th century, more furniture makers existed and sound construction techniques began to become standardized. There are numerous periods over the past centuries and each of these had a style or styles associated with them. Additionally, each country had a style of its own within these periods. One can see how similar furniture design principles were adopted by successive countries over the different periods. Popular furniture styles which are widely recognized have familiar names such as English Chippendale, German Biedermeier, American Federal and Arts & Crafts, French Art Nouveau, Italian Rococo, etc. The evolution continues to more recent styles such as Modern Swedish ( Krenov style) and Contemporary styles.

One interesting tidbit is that a style of furniture is never really defined until the particular period has elapsed, almost like looking through a rear view mirror. Today's styles might be referred to as a particular period of style, but only after the period has lapsed. In the photo, a small swedish modern styled tabletop cabinet . To be continued...

Dash almost complete...

In my last post I had the dash veneered on both sides and the cutouts for the gauges and switches prepared . I am now kicking myself for not taking a picture of the dash panel when I received it and the dismal state it was in. In any case, I began to apply the finish which consisted of a lightly tinted danish oil, the tint a light colored shade of walnut. After I let this dry for two days, I began to apply the top coat of a wipe-on polyurethane. Since the dash panel is exposed to temperature and environmental extremes, humidity, and possibly direct sunlight, polyurethane is a good finish to seal out the elements. The original dash panel delaminated and the veneer was flaking off due to these same environmental extremes, so I had to make sure the correct finish is applied.

I'm just about done with applying the multiple coats of this wipe-on poly with light sanding between coats with fine sandpaper. The back of the dash panel is similarly top coated with a polyurethane finish along with the continuous edge of the dash panel and the gauge openings. I'm trying to leave nothing to chance with respect to moisture or humidity permeating the dash panel.

In the photo, I have a portion of the dash panel. The bird's eye figure stands out well and is deep and vibrant. Next I will complete assembly of the small glove box hardware and ship off to the owner. From what I understand the restore of the vintage TR6 is going to be complete in a matter of weeks and I also look forward to seeing the dash in the car. If you click the image you can see more detail in a larger photo.

A different type of woodworking...

I've been tasked with reconstructing the wood dash panel from a vintage British automobile which is currently being restored. The dash was previously veneered and after about thirty five years, it succumbed to the elements and began to delaminate. Along with this, the original veneered surfaces were cracked and flaking off. This is a type of work I have not done before. The only effective way to remove the veneer completely and uniformly was with a sanding machine. After performing this on either side of the dash panel, I had clean wood underneath. The wood was high grade plywood with many plies. I judiciously re-laminated the laminations which were separating, which was no small feat. Once I was completely satisfied that the plywood dash had regained its strength and rigidity I began to plan the application of veneers both on the face and back of the dash panel.

The veneers were applied one at a time, beginning with the back of the dash panel. I cross banded or alternated two layers of the back cherry veneers to add rigidity and strength to the dash panel. I next cut out the multitude of holes from the back along with screw holes and rectangular cut-outs. I used reamers, sanding pads, and small half-round and round files to accomplish this.After I was satisfied with this, I applied veneer, bird's eye maple, to the face of the dash. Similar to the back, I re-created the holes, cut-outs, etc. from the front. Next, I veneered the glove compartment box door following the same procedure.

In the photo, I have just completed veneering and sanding the dash panel, glove compartment door, and have it fitted in its opening. Some more small detail work and I am almost ready to apply finish to the dash panel. There were some stressful moments in all this, veneer being so thin with very little margin for error, but it seems to have worked out. I thought I would share this experience.

Drawer cases installed...

After some deliberation, I decided that I really like the drawer case layout and went ahead and permanently installed them in the cabinet. The mounting method I arrived at is actually quite straightforward. The right hand drawer case is pegged to the bottom of the cabinet with four short dowel pieces. It is not directly attached to either the back or right side of the cabinet with this method, eliminating any wood movement issues however small they might be. The left hand single drawer case is also not directly attached to the cabinet side or back for the same reason. Instead I created a small platform for the left drawer case using two pieces of beech with grain in the same direction as the rest of the cabinet.

The two pieces of beech are directly below the left drawer case on either side and do not extend completely to the front, but approximately one half the distance. The drawer case can be considered to be cantilevered on this small platform. Also, to make the platform sides somewhat subtle in appearance, I created a fair size chamfer at the leading edges rather than have a square edge. This has successfully accomplished the effect I intended. The platform sides are pegged to the cabinet and right hand drawer case with one alignment dowel and subsequently glued to the left side and right drawer case. The back is open however, and the back panel can be seen in the opening.

I attached the left drawer case to the platform sides with 3 vertical lengths of dowels on either side, this adds considerable strength to the left drawer case. In doing so, I have left myself the option for the hidden compartment panel I might or might not install later on. In the photo, you can see the chamfered platform sides. Next, I begin to plan the actual drawers, something I've been longing to begin.

Laying out the drawer cases (1)...

I have had to take a short break from this project due to circumstances and other work in my schedule. I'm back on track with this cabinet now and I am in the process of laying out the configuration of the drawer cases. The original plan had one upper drawer at the top left and the two drawer assembly at the lower right. Upon reflection, I decided to configure the drawer cases differently as in the photo. This is somewhat of a staggered, stepped arrangement with the appearance of a floating drawer at the left with the original location of the two drawer case at the right. Since I have complete freedom to lay out the drawer cases as long as there is sufficient room above either of the drawer cases for art objects, I have taken this liberty in the design process.

At the left, beneath the single drawer case, I am also considering a false front which would appear as a solid piece of wood and is only removable through a hidden slot. This feature can be considered a secret compartment. I like the idea, but I also like the design of having the left drawer case appear to be floating as in the photo. I have mocked up the drawer cases with the empty compartment at the bottom left.

This is my current design dilemma and I will continue to experiment with the layout of the drawer cases.

Preparing the drawer cases (5)...

I left off with the individual boards which comprise the two drawer cases. I moved on, trimmed the boards and created the joinery for the sides and top and bottom. The joinery will consist of a rabbet with some small reinforcement. I need to accurately trim the sides of the dual drawer case since there is an allowance for the middle drawer divider which needs to be taken into consideration. The accuracy revolves around the fact that I want each of the three drawers to be of the same general height.The dado for this particular divider will also be stopped, end just short of the front of the drawer case. This allows me to have the upper drawer have a lower lip to meet with the bottom drawer, hiding the center divider in the process.

In the photo, the drawer cases, not yet complete are placed sided by side and amazingly enough, there is hardly a gap between them. This allows me some flexibility in placement of the drawer cases, which has not quite been finalized yet.

Preparing the drawer cases (4)...

I have completed dimensioning, handplaning and scraping the surfaces of the panels for the drawer cases. The panels were longer in length than necessary, an extra length allowance of each of the panels comprises one side of each drawer case. These drawer case sides will be rabbeted into the top and bottom panels. The grain orientation of the drawer cases is similar to the cabinet top and bottom, this is purposely designed in to accommodate any expansion and contraction due to humidity changes in the ambient air. In the lower drawer case, the sides are somewhat longer to accommodate two drawers and a drawer divider. The hardwood drawer divider will be fitted into dadoed slots in the center of either side of the drawer case. Dadoes run perpendicular to grain orientation as opposed to grooves which run parallel to the grain orientation.

The drawer case sides, and top and bottom panels are oriented in the same direction to have the complete drawer case movement occur front to back similar to the cabinet itself. The drawer case sides need to be trimmed to size next and then a dado created in the dual drawer case. The drawer cases are assembled afterwards with careful attention to maintaining the drawer cases perfectly square. Once the assembly is complete, I will fit the drawer divider into its dado.

I'm anxious to begin work on the drawers and have yet to decide whether the drawer faces will be a contrasting color, most likely so. In this case, I need to find a wood which complements European Beech.

Preparing the drawer cases (3)...

The measurements of the boards which comprise the four drawer case panels are a tad smaller than originally planned, so I have had to forgo squaring the ends of the boards of each of eight boards. Instead I have assembled the eight boards into four panels and will instead square then ends of these panels off. It is just an arbitrary decision at this point and doesn't affect the assembly of the panels, although nicer panels would have resulted had I squared the ends of the boards first. This also allows me to dial in as much length as absolutely possible in each of the panels.

I had also jointed the mating edges of each of the boards, the edge which mates with the other, matching board of the panel. This went well and I let the boards sit for a day or so afterwards to determine if any further cupping would result. A very small bit of cupping did result, and of course it becomes more pronounced due to the width of the panels. The next step involved scribbling witness lines across each of the cupped faces of the boards and handplaning the outside edge area working towards the middle. I regularly go back and forth with a flat, steel rule to determine how much progress is being made. I also try not to overshoot... which essentially decreases the overall thickness of each of the boards.

At this point, I have four panels ready to be squared to finish dimensions, both in width and length. A small part of each of the panels form the sides of the drawer case. I will also need to cross cut these sections off, which leaves me with four shorter panels which form the tops and bottoms of the drawer case.

I'm going to take some time and spend it outdoors today. We had wintry weather until late last week, but this week has been getting wamer and sunnier with temps in the low 70's today. We've had such a long winter up here, and this weather couldn't arrive soon enough.