a hickory sideboard

to go with the reclaimed chestnut table in the previous post, we were also commissioned to build this natural hickory sideboard. it's a long one, almost 9' and 32" high. when it gets its 2" thick stone top, it will be 34" tall ... click the photos to enlarge them ...

it's a fairly straightforward piece of construction ... doors and drawers with adjustable shelves, but it was fun to compose the lights and darks and see them slowly all come together ..

it's got two silverware storage inserts in the drawers ....
arranging and rearranging the patterns ... the grain and color of the two center drawer faces was particularly interesting ...
it has a hickory ply case
with some applied face frame details to lend substance and contrast
and full extension undermount drawer runners for the 15" deep drawers ...
turned feet, similar to the table and applied raised moldings .. a fun project.

a reclaimed chestnut table with self storing leaves

sometimes you start out headed for one place and end up in another. this is one of those times. this table with the self storing pull out leaves on the ends grew from a design we created with another client, in another place, a table with round ends, and without the leaves ... you can see it in the photo below, and loyal readers may remember it from this blog post from may of last year. my current client liked that design but wanted a rectangular table ... no problem i thought ... or almost no problem in the end ... click the photos to enlarge them ...
basically, i thought i would just cut off the ends and add the pull out leaves, which i did in the drawing below, and we agreed it was great ... off we went ...
until we arrived here, where i noticed that sitting at the end of the table would not work, as you can see below, unless the leaves were pulled out. so we discussed this situation ... 3 chairs per side for six, pull out the leaves for 8 or more ...
not so good we decided in the end ... fortunately, since the table was made from reclaimed lumber and already had a few patches, after considering some reconfiguration options, we decided to remove the lower, mostly decorative understructure entirely, giving our client the seating flexibility she desired ... our previous design for pull out leaves was fussy to fabricate and sometimes confusing for the clients to operate, so using another table as a model as well as a nicely written fine woodworking article by tage frid from the 70's, we decided we would improve upon our design. will made a 1/4 size mockup using the math in the article, and we decided this was the way to go ... it works slicker than our old design and by applying the large areas of felt you can see on the bottom of the top below, it works really smoothly and the leaves are protected from scrathcing. you can see a very short you tube video of the opening and closing process at this link.
the top is not actually attached to the base but rather 'floats' up and down via a pair of steel pins in holes in the center of the center frame. you can see that in the video. in the picture above, the leaves are in the closed position but you can see the little guides that will made that are attached to that center frame and keep the leaves square as they open and close. a little shellac and wax on the runners and guides and they slide like a dream.
we routed a half inch wide channel, an 1/8th inch deep, around the felt area so we could staple the felt and not just glue it ... ta dah .. 88" closed to 132" open ... thank you again fine woodworking website ... the online access is the best $15.00 you can spend ...

seeders instruments banjo #8

well, seeders instruments banjo #8 arrived in northern ireland on friday ... it was will's first international website order. the shipping was a concern at first, but the US Postal Service handled it flawlessly. it left tuesday afternoon ... 3, or 2? days ... reasonable cost considering ...
it sounds great, as you can hear on this one minute clip of will playing and singing. link to the video here ...
i didn't get a lot of progress pictures. it got itself together and out the door mostly on evenings and weekends and went without a hitch, so i only occasionally glimpsed the progress as it went along.
great saturn peg head inlay. that pot and drawing on the right is his next project
regular old hard oil finish ... 6 or seven coats i think ...
the whole deal
and the label
great combo of woods and restrained design collaboration. i liked the no fretboard inlays much more than i expected to ...
back viewstay 'tuned' for more ... ha ha ...

update on new claro slabs available 3/26

we trucked our new slabs to berkshire products last week to ahve them sanded. many hundreds of dollars later, we can really see what they will be like ... they're not numbered the same as before, but you get the idea ... i think i'll let them speak for themselves ... click the photos to enlarge them ...
there's a fine desk in here i think
aka, 'the goat faced slab'
#5 in the photos below ... not bad ...
really not bad at all ...
funky one ...and below is the original post ...
well, this one looks like it's going to be a beauty. the next time you see it, it will be more obvious, but i can tell you now that this piece of timber is pretty spectacular. it's slab #2 above. true, it's got some minor issues, but ooh lah lah, it looks like there is some fantastic stuff hidden in that roughness. it will make a great coffee or center table, and it's available to be transformed and delivered soon to you. lots of other claro walnut ideas to consider in this recent post. click the photos below to enlarge them.
i purchased these 4 new smaller slabs from my supplier, goodhope hardwoods, while shopping for the piece above that i purchased for a new client in new york city. it's going to be a 10 foot dining table. it's hard to see here, but it's covered in curly figure from one end to the other .. i hope to start working it up later this week.

3/26 .. less hard to see now

crazy !!
i also purchased these three medium sized slabs and it looks like number 3 or #1 will make a really nice desk. a few years back, we made this mango wood desk, and ever since, i've been meaning to do another along those lines as a spec piece. i'm working with the director of exhibitions at the guilford, vermont welcome center on route 91 and hope to show some pieces there this summer. nothing like a claro walnut desk to grab some eyeballs.
i just realized i forgot to photograph slab #2, but i'll get on that tomorrow.
and i've still got this last piece from the previous set. it is literally in two pieces, cracked from end to end, but is hanging on the wall with steel tube stiffeners for now ... i can see a nice curved, end to end set of butterflies, big to small to big again, reconnecting the two pieces into one fine dining table. it's about 45 x 90 x 1.375 thick. great figure hiding in there too. it's the next one in the log from the one below .. nice ..
in case you are wondering if i robbed a bank to buy this wood, there's an explanation having to do with our recent show at the southern vermont arts center. we had, as ed sullivan used to say, "a really good show" ... it comes down this tuesday.

march 17, and then it was spring

winter's over here as of today ... bluebirds are back in the yard, buzzards are back, ducks are back, 70 degrees today, the convertible top was down, fire in the sky, and it's only the middle of march. what next tomorrow? hummingbirds? golf? maybe on the golf, another month at least until hummingbirds ... peace ...
great sunset on peter's peak