MY LATEST PROJECTS...
END TABLES
I built these end tables as a house warming present to my wife as we moved into a new house in 2004. These were the first Arts & Crafts pieces I have built and I think they turned out well. The wood is quarter sawn white oak, finished with Minwax "Red Oak" stain and satin polyurethane. Once we had these in place, we definitely needed a coffee table to match. These photos show our living room when it still had carpeting covering up the beautiful wood floors.
LADDER SHELVES
When my stepdaughter asked for a set of shelves for her room, I scoured catalogs and magazines looking for ideas and came up with the design below. I built it completely of poplar and finished it with a good quality white acrylic paint.
COFFEE TABLE
Seen below is the matching coffee table to go with the Arts & Crafts end tables. I really like how this project turned out, and I am thrilled with the grain on this quarter sawn white oak. About the only downside to this table is that it weighs a TON!
Here is another view of the arts and crafts coffee table showing the beautiful grain (and some inevitable coffee table clutter).
WINE TABLE
This next project was called a "Vintner's Valet" by the woodworking magazine I got the idea from. I built this from quarter sawn white oak (in the A&C style) and I am pleased with the results. It holds 15-18 wine glasses and up to 14 bottles of wine. This is my favorite project so far. Notice the hardwood floors I found under that horrible blue carpeting!
NIGHT STAND
My stepdaughter asked for a nightstand to match the white painted furniture in her room. I found this plan from Wood magazine and adapted it to our needs. Because it would be painted I intended to built it completely of poplar, but my lumber supplier didn't have any decent poplar when I needed it. I ended up building this nightstand almost completely of basswood (American Linden). Though basswood is very light and not as strong as poplar, I was impressed by how easy it was to work and how inexpensive it was. By putting a few pieces of poplar into the case where extra strength was needed or where fasteners would be placed I was able to construct a very nice piece that should last a long time - and it didn't break the bank!
BOOK CASE
My wife and I had been kicking around the idea of a long set of low bookshelves for our living room for quite a while when I saw a design we both liked in Woodsmith magazine. Their shelves were twice as tall and each unit was a bit narrower, but I did get some good design ideas from them! Though these shelves are neither in the arts and crafts style nor made of q/s white oak, they do fit in well enough with our other living room furniture. I built these out of birch plywood and some nice solid yellow birch that I got CHEAP on Ebay. The sides and shelves are plywood while the top, face frames, and all the moldings I made from the solid yellow birch. The finish was an ordeal not to be repeated. I first used two coats of Minwax gel stain in a medium shade of brown. I then put on one coat of wipe-on polyurethane, followed by a glaze coat of a reddish Minwax gel stain. To finish it off I gave it two coats of wipe on polyurethane. Although I liked the arts and crafts style projects better, these are some great shelves for under $100!
ROUND ACCENT TABLE
I had some really special, very beautiful quarter sawn shingle oak boards that I got for a very good price on Ebay. When I saw this table plan in a favorite woodworking magazine I just new I had to build it! I used the q/s shingle oak boards for the top and some straight grained white oak for the legs. Though you cannot tell from the photos, the tops of the legs are joined by two cross peices, joined to each other in the center with a half-lap joint and joined to each leg by a dovetail joint. The table is finished with Minwax red oak stain and satin polyurethane. This was a very fun project to build - I got to use my new band saw on both the top and the curved rails connecting the bottom of the legs. This was the last project I built in the Decatur workshop (late 2006) before we moved to a new city and bigger and better things...
TELEVISION TABLE
Here is the first project I completed in my new shop (2007). My stepdaughter had asked me for a table to put her 19" tv on. The table needed to be tall enough that she could see the tv screen while laying in bed, and it needed to match all of the other white painted furniture in her room. I also decided to add a shelf to hold her dvd/vcr combo machine. I had some decent poplar in my shop, and I just sort of designed this table on the fly. Now that it is done, it looks pretty good and serves its purpose perfectly!
BEER GLASS SHELF
Since completing the wine table a few years ago, I have become very passionate about craft beer. I now brew my own beer as well as regularly collect and enjoy craft beers from around the United States and all over the world. I created this shelf as a way to display my beer glass collection. I didn't have a plan, I just sort of winged it, using through tenons to hold it all together. It is made of some scraps I had in the shop (for the life of me I cannot remember what the wood is but I think it is red elm). I finished it with Minwax red oak stain and a few coats of wipe-on polyurethane. It looks pretty good above the wine table!
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