all claro wlanut, all the time

ok, claro wlanut, i love this wood ... fancy, warm, vibrantly figured most of the time, stable, flat; it's all good ... and we have made a lot of stuff with it. lately, as we get more requests for custom pieces, i have come to feel the need to have some photos of our different items in one place ... a sort of, 'here, this about sums it up' link, so i don't have to get a picture here, get another picture there, find a picture of that specific table base .... etc, etc. if you make custom stuff for other people, and have been doing it for a while, you'll know what i mean ... anyway; here goes ... please click the photos to enlarge them ...
first up, cause i like the warm and fuzzy photo at the top, is this coffee table we made for a client in the boston area, who actually had the luxury of keeping it on her covered porch along with a collection of our outdoor lounge chairs ... for more info on this project, check out this blog post ...
sometimes, at the end of a project we even get letters like the one above .. 'my home has been trumped by the table' ... hmmmm, i doubt it, cause i've seen photos of the house, but it's a nice compliment, regardless. it goes with the table on the crossbuck base below, and the original blog post from 2008 is here. i think that one may be the one that started it all for us ... but here's another early one, and the first table we did with the solid steel base, what we refer to as our 'shaker style' legs ... learning process on that one ... but, we got 'er done, and have done many others with that style legs in both bright and blackened steel the original blog post is here ...
we made a little model first on the cnc and sprayed it with the krylon metalllic paint. looks like the real thing, only a tenth as big ...
the finished table, cut from its backgroundbirds eye view of the grain in the top ...
sometimes we have to assist mother nature in getting the shape exactly right
but all's well that ends well .... this was a big one ... about 4' wide and 11' long ... original blog post here ...
and above is another letter from a happy desk client ... some drawers and secret compartments made for a really special desk ... this was a recent one from late last year ... more info here


we start with slabs like this one; in fact we bought four from goodhope, from the same log and used them for the desk above, the table below, the table we have in our current show at the southern vermont arts center, and we still have one more available on out wall that you can see a couple photos down ...
this was a fantastic piece of wood when it was all polished up, and it's now happy in its new home in the hamptons ... california to goodhope hardwoods in pennsylvania to vermont, to east hampton .... lots of miles on most of these. we have two to montana, about a 6000 mile trip !!

 above are thee versions of our 'trapezoid' bases, a desk, a dining table and a coffee table.  these bases are all also available in 'natural', rainbow, and blackened finishes.

several tables have our ladderback chairs in one form or another ... these above sport nice 'bomber jacket leather' seats.
the raw material ... often, not perfect, though with lots and lots of potential ...
this one heads off to england next week in a pair of crates via ocean freight. even more miles on that one ... this has a new base design based on our designer client's input ... again, a model was helpful in determining the final proportions ... more info here ...
the leg assemblies are drilled tapped and bolted together and can be easily shipped flat, in pieces.and we often add butterflies to both decorate and stabilize the cracks.
this one is in our current show at the southern vermont arts center in nearby manchester.great figure and grain character in this one ... and this is the last slab from the spectacular log you have seen in some of the previous pictures. it's from closest to the center of the log and probably has, actually, the best figure yet. it was completely cracked into two pieces when it arrived, and we intend, in the end, to probably use it as two pieces, connected by butterflies, but separated as above by a 1/4 inch or so. even without finish the color is amazing ... call now to discuss your options ...
sometimes a client will select a slab from the goodhope 'specials' or 'coffee table slab' page and we add just simple wooden or polished steel pipe bases. keep it simple stupid ... and now we're at the sawbuck base table that goes with the letter at the top ... solid, twist and reverse twisted 1.25" steel crosspiece by sam in the metal shop ...
or we can weld other steel base designs from structural stock ... these pieces were fabricated by sam in the metal shop from 3/4" stock and some round, 1.5" solid bar stock

more info on this project here ... again with the models ... love 'em ...
some polished or black pipe legs .. instant coffee table
this bed and side table assembly went to florida and is made from a pair of american, not claro walnut, but spectacular nonetheless. i post it with the claro pieces because the design could easily be made using a claro slab as well ...
and sometimes we get to make a little bench for a new york city apartment entrance hall ... this one is 36" x 15". small, but i love the form and it opens up the possibility for others like it as well as new dining table base designs.
specs and shapes of our available leg designs, all of which can be customized and made heavier, lighter, wider, or shorter, as you wish. our most popular is the one above, in 1.5" thick steel.

and pretty much any welded shape you can come up with can be fabricated by sam in our in house custom metal shop
and here, i'll talk VERY GENERALLY AND UNSPECIFICALLY about prices ...these prices of these tables are directly related to what we have to pay for the wood slab, delivered to our shop. a rule of thumb seems to be, or could be about $1000. to $1400. per lineal foot of table ... anyway, that's a place to start, but the final price could be more or less than that, if, for example, you select an extra wide, extra long, or figured slab, or one with some extra character from the specials page. each project is priced individually with the cost of the wood being the main factor ...

we sell the leg assemblies separately. the solid, waterjetted, 1.5" thick sets start at $3500. as drawn and pictured in the natural finish.  for the black or rainbow patina, add $400. there is a separate upcharge for custom shapes and 1.75" thick stock.  for each design that upcharge is different. custom shape and thickness quotes on request.  shipping for the bases in the northeast would be +/- 250-350.  nationwide quotes are available with your shipping address.

so, 'here, this about sums it up' for claro walnut for now ... but i also feel like we have just scratched the surface ...

other walnut blogs posts at the links below:
a dozen big ones
how much does a claro walnut slab table cost?
one for sale right now

the bullseye chestnut mirror

well, yesterday was the opening of our show at the southern vermont arts center ... see the post below ... we had 8 pieces there, plus six of our ladderback chairs ... in the last few years we have participated in shows only on a 'piece here, piece there' basis and this was our first 'solo' show in recent memory ... maybe since the 90's ... since our normal work had to be ongoing to pay the bills, i spent a few recent weekends working on some of the smaller pieces in the show. one of my favorites is this bullseye mirror in reclaimed chestnut. it was partly inspired by the traditional federal round mirror form and i was also influenced by the lines in my 'roomate', marta johansen's drawings. click the photos to enlarge them ... the mirror was an interesting project involving, ( but not necessarily requiring) cnc work, turning large diameter round things, painting and gold leafing ... and then we had to figure out how to display it free standing so as not to compete with marta's drawings on the walls.
i started a couple of weeks ago by cutting two round pieces of 1" mdf on the cnc, gluing them together and then mounting them on my lathe's outboard 8" faceplate. i added a hole in the center and made four flat moldings which i applied to the face before i turned it, turning roughly and quickly just to see how it went. we then took it all the way through the process by adding some latex paint while it was spinning and the goldleaf after that. the result was a lovely contradiction of materials, 'gold leafed mdf '. anyway after constructing a quick floor stand we stuck it in the office and it was a hit ... then, i had to make the real thing.
i started with two mitered squares of 5/4 reclaimed chestnut, and then, by staggering the joints at 45 degrees, glued them together in the veneer bag.i then mounted the blank on a piece of mdf and took it to the cnc to cut the center hole for the mirror and the 22" diameter outside circle. using the same file, i cut a piece of 1" plywood with a centered 8" recess for my faceplate. you could do all this with a jigsaw and/or a circle cutting jig on your bandsaw, but, when you have a cnc, the tendency is to use it.i then cut rabbeted moldings that were 3/4" thick and created the recess for the mirror, which was a 12" 'security' mirror from uline ... love em ... real glass and relatively inexpensivethe moldings were also cut on the cnc with the rabbets up (photo above this one)and then freed from the block by taping the cut face with packing tape and running the blank through the sander till they separated. on to the outboard end of the lathe. since the 1" ply faceplate piece was cut on the cnc it was a simple matter to make a light face cut on the plywood to true it up and then mount the main blank on it, and have at it. i had expected i would have to change to my really slow speed pulley and belt, but the whole thing was true enough to turn at the regular lowest spindle speed, which truly surprised me.. while it was on the lathe, i added some aniline dye and federal blue milk paint, polishing off the high points to leave the paint only in the recesses.
the next day will very carefully taped off the moldings, we figured out the locust firewood base and supports (if you click the photo here, you can see the steel pipe brackets that sam made to accept the polished 3/4" rebar vertical support. that allow the mirror to spin and also allowed us to take it apart to move it to the show. the locust block was completely green and quite heavy.
here are both corner mirrors on their stands, which looked a little garish with the fresh cut yellow locust wood. more on that below ...
will applied the gold size and the next day, he did the leaf. i was in a hurry when i did the original turning; it was a beautiful day; i had a paddle tennis game ... i skipped the milk paint ground coat we always use under the size and there were some 'holidays' where the size had soaked into the mostly bare wood ...
we reapplied the size to the bare spots and touched up the gold leaf the next day
out to the driveway where we toasted and scrubbed both pieces of the raw locust and polished it with a red scotchbrite pad on the dynabrade.it looked pretty cool so we left it
all in, all done ... off to the show ... the room looked great with everything in place and we had a great turnout ...
for closeups of other pieces and more pictures of the work of the other 8 painters (no other furniture makers; i'm flattered) in the show, visit this link
a little more marketing coming up this week with the arrival of our new postcards tomorrow ...