End Grain Floor #3: Islands

The theme of the floor is that is resembles an old sailing map. It gets deeper than that as the map itself is one of the mind.

As I laid the tiles I also wanted to inlay the landmasses and islands with them in order to save tiles. (I hate wasting wood) I would still have to cut up some of the glued down tiles but that is life! On some of the islands, I was not sure where I was going to place them so very tile had to be carefully removed. I would place the burl down, trace around it, hand route the line with a 1/4in down spiral bit (it needs to be down spiral to eliminate tear out!) taking several passes and then chisel out the waste.

The first island came from a Pine Burl my father gave me. He pulled it out of the ground when I was a boy and tried to burn it. It refused to go. Later, I remember climbing on it, carving on it, nailing on it and what have you. 20 years later I cut it into a sentimental piece of my shop floor!

I used Titebond Duty Construction Adhesive to attach the burls to the floor. The first burl was way to thick so I had to spend time planing it down!

This set of islands is called the Iles of Dreams. The large island is the Island of Waking Dreams, meaning all those thing we have ambitions about, and the smaller ones are the Islands of Sleep…and that I think is obvious:). Labels for each land mass are coming.

More to follow…

-- "With a little bit of faith, and some imagination, you can build anything!" Nate