refreshing a george nakashima table

we delivered this 1959 george nakashima table to its new home yesterday .. it is a
beautiful octagonal room with floor to ceiling cherry paneling
it was a sunny day and the photography was difficult, but you get the idea.
see the finished top in the sunshine in the last photo in this post.

 the table had been kerfed when it arrived here and we added a few more
to flatten the top which had curled over a 1/2" over its six foot width .
we also moved the short stiffeners out a couple of inches to get them closer
 to the edge of the table .. it's pretty flat now if i do say so myself.

trevor and tyler attaching the base to the top on site ...
the laurel top is EXTREMELY heavy, and there is no
way it could have been delivered with the base in place.

on arrival, we discovered that the base could be completely

disassembled.  we labeled all the intersections,cleaned the joints, 

and reglued it with hot hide glue

trevor also reinforced the half lapped joints with long screws after the glue had set

you can see the curve of the top and the color that the top
was in its unfaded color

this is what the top looked like before trevor scraped it down
based on how yellow it was, we're guessing it was nitrocellulose
 lacquer applied at some time in the past

just starting to see the natural color in the scraper shavings

sanded and ready for finish

a little alcohol as a test

oiled up with 6 coats of waterlox .. 

ready for the next 60 years

great spot!

an 80 inch round table.. opens to 128 inches

we finished up this 80" round walnut table last week and the owners are waiting

for a custom carpet to be delivered before we can ship it

it is very similar in design to the 74" round walnut table we did back in july

when disassembled for finishing, we counted over 60 separate pieces
including aprons, moldings, and stiffeners ...

lots of time consuming staining, sanding and finishing on this baby ..

cant wait to see it in its new home, probably sometime after labor day now

half lapped base pieces with a central post

and we used some different, more rigid runners from hettich

to help with the weight of the table when extended and some

similar hardware from rockler for the drop down legs ..

the base is glued up from 4 'cs' dominoed and glued to the central post

these could have been cut on the bandsaw from a pattern, but trevor has

 found he can get faster results by cutting as deep as he can on the cnc, 

then a quick, rough cut the rest of the way through on the bandsaw,

and then a clean up with a large flush cut bit in the router ..

each pair is joined by glue and double dominos,

and then they are all glued to the post on the table saw, upside down,

 with the base attached .. similar to the previous pedestal table, the short grain at

the ends of the curves are reinforced by 5/8ths wide splines

glued into kerfs cut with the dado heads ... these spines also function

as places to screw the cross of the base and the sub top to 

you can see them more clearly in this blog post ...

i'd like to see that cherry table now.  i bet the color and figure are fantastic.

more miscellaneous parts and pieces below ...

a walnut table for a banquette

sent a walnut table shuffling off to bufflao a couple weeks ago

it was designed for a corner banquette to allow easy entrance

pretty straightforward on the top and apron.  trevor cut the shape of the top and 

the apron corners and moldings on the cnc, glued up the aprons

and added the beads

and i photo documented the mitering process this time ..

we've done this base numerous times, but if trevor were out sick, it would 

take me a minute to figure out the process .. got it now ..

make a jig, make the first cut, flip it end for end, make the second cut ..

the pieces look like this after mitering .. while they don't show here,
we insert 3/4" oak dowels into the miters to catch the
long lag boltscoming up from the  cross base.
we use domino joinery when we glue up the
four mitered pieces ..

there is a 3/4" subtop that ties the four verticals together and
splines in the tops to reinforce the short grain when the subtop's attached

always nice to have a happy customer ..

more testimonials here