Journal

Feathers Finished

I meant to post this a few weeks ago but in all of the running about I totally forgot.

This is a great  version of the wall cabinet from my book sent in by Chris Griggs from New Orleans, LA. Chris and I have been corresponding back and forth for the past year or more and I was thrilled to see his version of ‘Ain’t no feathers around here boys…’

thanks for sharing Chris!

Well Tom,

I finally finished “Feathers” so I thought I’d send you an update. This was a lot of fun to build and I am quite pleased with the results.

With the exception of a power drill (I have since gotten a Miller Falls egg beater), everything was done with hand tools. I started with S2S lumber so the prep work wasn’t too extreme but I still had to reflatten all the faces and joint all the edges with my No. 6.  I think I mentioned this in a previous email but FYI the cabinet is a combination of walnut (door and drawer fronts), soft maple (the carcass) and pine (back panel and drawer sides).

As I’ve also mentioned previously, I adapted your design to be a jewelry cabinet for my fiancée.  The right side has a rotating 6 peg hanger made by Brusso for hanging necklaces.  The left side, which is for earrings, has brass jeweler’s wire strung across it, attached to a brass eye screws. The finish is Tried and True Original, which I have fallen in love with.  It’s a gorgeous finish and I love the fact that its most severe hazard warning states “ingestion of large amounts may cause nausea.”  Large amounts! 🙂 So I guess that means if one were to ingest small amounts (not sure why) they would have little to no ill effects. What other finish can say that???  It’s awesome!

Going into this build, I thought the dovetails would be the most challenging part. Well, the dovetailing went quite well, and it was seemingly simpler things (i.e. fitting/joining the interior of the cabinet) that proved to be the bigger challenge. It’s been said before and I’ll say it again. Cutting dovetails is overrated. Don’t get me wrong, I love dovetails. They’re a beautiful, strong joint, and doing them well is an accomplishment of which I proud.  However, if this project taught me anything it’s that there are plenty more, equally difficult and more important skills in woodworking.

I want to commend you on choosing this design for you book. Now that I’ve completed it I can tell that you really put a lot of thought into designing projects that would help a relatively novice hand tool woodworker bring their work to the next level.  Completing his project really helped me feel confident in my dovetailing and it taught me a lot about cabinet construction in general.

Anyway, that’s all for now.  I know you’re staying busy which is always a good thing.

Keep well,

Chris Griggs

New Orleans, LA

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