Sketch, scaled drawings, story stick, and posts.
I decided to enter a post now and then about the woodworking part of Eggtooth Originals, so here goes.
This winter I am fortunate to be working on a commission of a three piece bedroom set. The matching pieces include a Chest of Drawers, Nitestand, and full-sized bed. As many of you may already be aware, my furniture style is mainly “post and panel” where my pieces have shaped legs or posts in each corner and free-floating solid wood panels between. I try to make each of my pieces interesting by combining different color or species of woods in each furniture piece. Generally, I use darker colored wood in the legs or posts to “frame in” the lighter colored wood panels; I really like that contrast. In this bedroom set, the posts (or legs) and frame pieces will be made from Pacific Madrone and the panels will be made from some unique pear wood from a homestead on the South Fork Trinity River in California (I also really like to know where my native wood comes from and the story behind it).
The photo shows how I typically proceed in the early stages of a new project….from upper right clockwise: I sketch my concept in my permanent sketch book; transfer the sketch to a scaled drawing; transfer the critical measurements to a life-sized and shaped story stick; then actually start the cutting and joinery on the posts or legs. Sometimes I build a mock-up of the piece out of cardboard, however in the current work I didn’t believe that was necessary. I am simultaneously doing a a small desk for myself that has very similar components and processes, where I hope to make all of my mistakes so they are avoided with the commission work.
Both madrone and pear are woods that have their workability issues (like hardness, checking, fracturing, and color blotching) so that is an added challenge with these already complex pieces. I planned (and priced) this project to take about 150 hours, but suspect that I have been overly conservative in my estimate…time will tell. I have allowed plenty of acclimation time for the wood to rest and adjust between each of the early dimensioning steps…better to do that now than have the wood move alot after I put it together into a finished piece.
This week I am cutting joinery on the dimensioned frame pieces that have now rested in the shop for nearly two weeks; resawing and gluing-up panels for the chest of drawers and bed; and resawing drawer box materials for later assembly. That said we will see what the week holds as it progresses.
That’s all (and enough) for today’s post…more photos of progress on our Facebook page. Hope you have a great weekend and week ahead…jack
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