| Project by AstroGuy | posted 1978 days ago | 1534 views | 6 times favorited | 9 comments |  |
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Well…I finished my 9 year old daughter’s Christmas gift and gave it to her today. This is a small jewelry chest with three drawers made from bubinga. I gave it to her with a sheet describing the origin of the wood and its connection to Cameroon (the source of the wood). She’s very enthusiastic about wild animals and the environment. I think it was more fun for her to have a perspective on how this chest is a connection to west africa, the age of the tree, various animals that might have spent time under it, etc. I was fortunate to have some help from online woodworkers who put me in touch with sources for pictures of bubinga trees, Cameroon, etc.
This project was designed in sketchup (my second design that way). The chest is bubinga (a first for me) and the drawers are a combination of bubinga and maple with half-blind dovetails (another first). The dovetails, alas, were made with a router jig but perhaps I’ll try hand cut for the next series. The chest has small turned feet (first #3). The drawers are lined with velvet and the two top drawers have custom made half-lap dividers to separate jewelry (a different pattern for each drawer; first #4). I thought about flocking the drawers but ran out of time. The chest is finished with General Finishes Armor Seal, Shellac (for the inside parts) and wax. I also hid an inscription to my daughter under a drawer that should be a surprise someday.
This was a really fun project and I learned a lot in the process. Its great to try new things even if they often crash and burn. I loved using this wood which is dense, has a great story and holds detail well. Not the easiest to hand plane, though.
At any rate, happy holidays everyone.
Rick
-- Richard
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9 comments so far
FlWoodRat
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732 posts in 2082 days
#1 posted 1978 days ago
What a beutiful keepsake. Your daughter is a very lucky young lady. Perhaps someday she will find the inscription and relive the love that went into the work
-- I love the smell of sawdust in the morning....
Grumpy
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#2 posted 1978 days ago
Very nice job Rick. Now all you have to do is fill it with jewellery, only kidding.
-- Grumpy - "Always look on the bright side of life"- Monty Python
Chris
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#3 posted 1978 days ago
Wonderful Job Rick! What was her reaction?
-- "Everything that is great and inspiring is created by the individual who labors in freedom" -- Albert Einstein
TomFran
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#4 posted 1977 days ago
This is beautiful and will be treasured. Nice work!
-- Tom, Surfside Beach, SC - Romans 8:28
mot
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#5 posted 1977 days ago
Ahhh, that came out great!
-- You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation. (Plato)
Blake
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#6 posted 1977 days ago
Now that is a beautiful piece of work. Congratulations. It will be prized for generations.
-- Happy woodworking! http://www.blakeweber.us
AstroGuy
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43 posts in 2217 days
#7 posted 1976 days ago
Thanks everyone for your kind comments. She was quite happy with it and I am sure she will enjoy using it for a long time. Happy holidays!
-- Richard
Bob A in NJ
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#8 posted 1976 days ago
Very nice box. Love the color, design features of routed drawer slides and the dovetails. How long did it take to build?
-- Bob A in NJ
AstroGuy
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43 posts in 2217 days
#9 posted 1969 days ago
Bob,
The box took me about 2 months to build but, frankly, that was due to very off and on effort. Work and other projects kept getting in the way. I’m sure that an experienced woodworker could bang one of these out pretty quickly.
I wanted to use the project to work on some techniques, most notably hand plane skills and machine cut dovetails so I took the long path to many steps (i.e. designing it out in sketchup, resawing 8/4 stock for the bubinga, using hand planes for the surfacing, and a new dovetail jig that I’d never used before for the joinery). I also used some “odd” materials, including hardwood maple flooring stock for the secondary parts which took some time to mill. Overall, it was good fun but not the most efficient path to the end result (which was ok with me).
Thanks for your comments.
Rick
-- Richard
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