A Recycled Chestnut Bathroom

Here's an example of what happens when you combine rustic wood with elegant architecture. You get a comfortable, clean, modern, antique, refined, and homey feeling all at the same time. The fixtures and architecture of the room are of the highest quality and completely up to the minute elegant, while the recycled chestnut, in my opinion, somehow keeps it all from going over the top. I could live in this bathroom ... The oriental carpet is the coup de grace .... We've been working on the various pieces, the vanity, the dressing table, and the mirrors, off and on for a couple of months now and when the room was complete, the client was not comfortable with a funny space that 'happened' between the window and the tub. So, he had us make a 14" wide custom table that went around the pipes and made a place for a champagne glass. That piece tied the whole room together. It was a fun project and a good use of recycled lumber to set a tone for a room. Click the pictures to enlarge them ....

The finished vanity

In process

The finished dressing table and tilting mirror

In process

The tub table

Fitted around the pipes with a removable insert held in place by magnets

Tub table in process

WORKSHARP

I'm not much one for plugging tools here, but every once in a while, one comes in the door that I really like. When that happens I like to share my good fortune ... This Worksharp grinder arrived last week and immediately went to work. Everyone likes the control and ease of use and the air cooled grinding feature. All in all, it's a winner and we're feeling sharper everyday. When your grinder craps out, give this one some consideration.
Here are some of my other favorites ... Stanley 81 two handled scraper ... much better than a card scraper once you get the hang of it ... Forrest Saw Blades ... Adobe Photoshop

The Banjo Is Done !!

Well .... It's done and it sounds GREAT ! For a first shot at building a banjo from scratch, I'm completely happy with the way it came out ... It took considerable patience on WIll's part to get the neck on right, and we learned a lot, about building a banjo and about working together on a project where we both had a little knowledge, but neither of us had the whole picture. We both stuck up for what we thought was right, which made the process decidedly more interesting. It's a good thing one of us (and it wasn't me) knew a lot about how a banjo should play, how it should be set up and what little things you can do to fine tune the finished product. Will has a couple more tweaks that he wants to do to it, but I think he's pretty happy with it too .... Hopefully, we'll add some sound to this entry soon .... Click the pictures to enlarge them .....

First notes, yesterday afternoon ...

The pot

The fretboard

Side view

Head on ...
Other Posts about making this banjo
First post/start up Making the rings and turning the pot
Second Post Progress Fitting the neck to the pot
Third Post Shaping the neck and adding the fretboard

Banjo Progress 8/28

8/28/09 Click the pictures to enlarge them ...

The strings were on briefly Thursday, just to check the fretting, and, while it was tempting to tune it up and play a little, the next step was to take the neck off and finish it before installing the fifth string tuner and the little nut that goes with it. After some internet research, Will decided that he would try French polishing the neck even though, except for a few small furniture repairs, we haven't done much of that.

The process .... and there are many descriptions of the french polishing process on the internet ... (Here's one) ... It's not brain surgery, but you definitely want to practice a little before attempting it for real, and you want to have some time AND some patience ... It takes a while to get it right

After doing the research, Will went with thinned, dewaxed shellac, olive oil as a lubricant, and rottenstone as a filler/polisher ...

8/28 The french polished neck curing for the weekend .. it is sooooo smooth ... Strings/notes/music? Tomorrow? Soon? I'm ready whenever ....

Inside view of the pot and the steel rod that holds all the parts together ...

8/26/09 ... Frets and side dots are in, neck is final shaped ... drilled for tuners and ready for the nut and the strings ....

Filing a bevel on the peg head .. I was not on hand for the installation of the frets, but I know it involved a brass hammer, a sand bag, some filing with a special fret file and some sanding/polishing

New banjo top right ... 110 year old project banjo from ebay lower left ... 12 and 3/4" pot ...really short neck ??? Peg head looks right with others by the same maker but Will has not yet found a picture of that exact model number with the short neck online

In an earlier post, we got to the point on our banjo where it was time to shape the neck and attach the fretboard. Will's got that all under control now and says he just has to final flatten the fretboard and then he can start installing the frets. After that I think, is a little finish on the neck, final fit up and bolting to the pot, tuners, strings, and music .... This week, I hope ... Click the photos to enlarge them ....

The jig for holding the neck blank for shaping. The neck is clamped to it on both ends.

The heel inlay

The peg head overlay

Locating the fingerboard placement using the nut against the peg head.

Gluing the finished, slotted fretboard to the rough shaped neck

getting close
The previous banjo post showing the steps in fitting the neck blank to the pot, turning and drilling the pot is here ....

dorsetcustomfurniture.com

In these economically challenging times it is probably a good idea to spend some time doing a little marketing work. For me that means it's time to update my website for the first time in a while. Faced with that task I reviewed my pictures of new work and realized that, in fact, 'writing my blog' has replaced 'updating my website' pretty much completely. So rather than have all these new pieces at the ends of all my product categories, I decided that it would be easier for website visitors to see our most recent work if I created an entirely new category. It's called 'New Stuff' ... All of the items in that new category have at least one corresponding blog entry. So, for folks who occasionally read my blog, it's a place to see individual items they might have missed and about which they might like to read. My website is sot of a 'picture book' ... little pictures with other captionless little pictures and a little text which give people a rather small idea of what a piece might be like. My blog, on the other hand, has photos that enlarge almost to full screen and detailed, sometimes lengthy descriptions of design background and process photos. I also plan, at some time in the near future to add another new category to my website called 'homeless ideas' which will show pages from my working sketchbooks of ideas that I have explored, but as yet have not built. I have no idea if these efforts will generate any new business but it's an interesting thing to have my new work (and Sam's metalwork) in an easily accesible and linked place. Check it out if you have a minute...Click the photos in this entry to enlarge them ...

Click here for this page ...


Click here for this page ...

And click here for this page ...

The Furnished Walnut Paneled Room

This morning, I saw the finished room that we have been working on, (and here), counting the design process, since the first of the year. It looked great. The architecture was by Liz Calabrese of Calabrese Architects and the interior design, fabrics, wall and floor coverings, colors, and some furniture was by Mary Jo Gourd of Ramsay Gourd Architects. While I kind of had a vision of it in my head as we were working, it had even a better warmth and depth as a completed project than as a visualization in my mind's eye ... The light coming in from the windows made it a little tough to photograph, but I think you can get the idea. We're going to put a folding, black speaker cloth door over the stereo equipment under the Claro walnut desk (bottom photo) and build a bar (we worked up an interesting concept to pursue this morning) for the longer wall opposite the fireplace. There are still personal touches to add, but, on the whole, I could move right in .... Click the pictures to enlarge them ...

Beautiful, bright, screened in porch on the south side

A game table area

The bar will go against the longer wall

Back to the beginning ... the door will go on the now open equipment cabinet under the desk

A Claro Walnut Slab Table

This post actually starts back in February when I wrote abut some claro walnut slabs that I had on hand. So far we've completed projects with two of the slabs ... I still have one available ... The latest project is a desk/table for a niche in the walnut paneled room we completed recently. It involved some fine metal fabrication and welding by Sam, as well as a good effort from the woodshop team to polish up the slab and get it to Holman Studios for one of Steve's fine finish jobs ... Anyway ... Here it is ... Click to enlarge the pictures for better viewing .....

Close up of the model and the figure in the Claro walnut top (from Good Hope Hardwoods)


The whole deal

Fine welding by Sam ... that's 3/4 x 6" solid bar welded to 1/2" and 1")

The naked base ...
The base building process below

The flat trestle bases and a 1.5" solid round bar connector ... drilled up through the bases and bolted to the tapped solid round stock ... Bolts and unbolts for shipping ...

The jig for welding the steel parts together

First end welded