visiting some old friends

i had a call recently from some clients that i made some furniture for

in the 90s and very early 2000s.  they recently sold their original vermont ski house

and moved to dorset.  even though they've been here a few years, i hadn't made the effort 

to stop and see them.  they got a small 'ring' on their table after a recent dinner party

and i got the call to come see if i could help with that.  i am still thinking on the best 

way to handle it.  but, i rnjoyed my visiti and it was good to see some furniture

i made nearly 20 years ago look pretty much like it did when i delivered it,

back in the day.

this is a cell phone picture i took when i visited the lasgt week ...

and this is a picture from my website that i took with 

my nikon film camera when i delivered the table, chairs, 

mirror and sideboard when it was new ...

the table and chairs today

the table picture from the dining table section of my website

construction shot in the shop

and it was also nice to see this curly oak and lacewood coffee table 

with some ebony and reclaimed piano key details

and a pair of our arts and crafts cherry and burl stools 

with their original fabric .. it;s all good ...

Table for the Cockatoo Chairs

9/24/09

The table made it to its garden home in Boston

The garden was beautiful ... and everyone is happy ...

We finished the table for the cockatoo chairs yesterday ... It'll be off to Boston next week sometime with the porch furniture in the post of 9/16 ...

We first glued up two of the ends with 15 minute epoxy on the metal to wood connection. .. Click the pictures to enlrge them ...

Then we clamped the two ends together with the connectors ... Once we screwed in the short 'bridge ' pieces in the middle of the steel parts, the table became incredible rigid ... We added the small steel pads at the base of the legs as a design detail and to protect the end grain of the legs where they will sit on the stone patio ...

Update 9 7 ... waiting for approval of the finish samples ...

Last week we delivered the 'Cockatoo Chairs' to their new home in Boston, and a beauty of a home it is. An H.H. Richardson ( great bio of the architect on Wikipedia) shingle style design from the 1880s. Beautiful home, beautiful furnishings, beautiful artwork and gardens. The chairs have landed in a VERY special place for sure. They are residing in the recessed area in the lower right corner of the photo below, near the front door, overlooking the garden ... perfect spot ... Now for a table to go with them. We used, as a starting point, an Arts & Crafts style table that the client has been using there previously with other chairs ... We made a couple sketches and today we made a quick mockup of one end of the table to work out the more mysterious construction details. Legs are mahogany; the aprons are 3/8 x 1.5" steel with wood verticals. The top will be slats of mahogany in a mitered frame ... We're considering 3/8 x 1.5" metal 'pads' where the table sits on the stone terrace and perhaps some other small decorative metal details which we'll either mockup or discuss with the client ... More later .... Click the photos to enlarge them ...

1883 H. H. Richardson designed home with serious wisteria

Sketches ... The client selected the bottom one

Our two dimensional mockup 'elevation' exploring how the curved and straight steel elements will join to the wood legs. The curved pieces will have to be mitered once they enter the leg as they are nearly as wide as the leg is thick ... We'll do a test, but after fitting them up, we imagine that we'll epoxy them iside the leg using a West System product of some kind. We rolled the steel into acurve using our new Boss ring roller, an amazing piece of equipment.

The straight top pieces will also have to be mitered in the corners and then screwed into the end grain of the mahogany legs

The 'elevation' stretched out using photoshop.