Mission style dining chair

So I decided to take a leap from small tables and case work and really challenge myself. We need a new table and chairs for the kitchen. The Mrs. loves mission-style furniture. I’m working with maple and staining to match the kitchen cabinets.

The table will be built starting this fall at school. Not that complicated of a project really, I just don’t have the room in my teeny garage shop to glue up a table top of that size. The chairs, on the other hand…

Phew.

I’ve finished the first one and, while it definately has some flaws, it didn’t come out too bad but Hell’s teeth, these things are difficult. So many weird angles, trying to make straight tenoned side supports meet up flush with the curve of the back legs… oy veh. That didn’t come out very well at all and I’m still trying to figure it out. Anyone have any ideas? It’s not as simple as scribing the ends of the side supports to meet the curve of the leg because I have the tenons protruding there to deal with.

Anyhow, first one is done, stained and glued up. Since I stained before assembly, which is almost a must with all of the little slats that mission furniture calls for, I made much use of blue tape to keep the stain off of my glue surfaces.

While making the first one I think I found most of the pitfalls (i.e. make the mortises for the slats in the back BEFORE you cut the curves in the upper and lower back rests so you have a square surface to reference against the fence of the mortiser), and made templates and jigs and angled auxillary “tables” to put on my mortiser to get things at the right angles so maybe the other three chairs will go faster and more easily than the first one.

Once that’s all done it’s time to challenge myself even further. The seats are cushioned, so it will be time to try my hand at some basic upholstry work.

Regards to all,
Allen

-- We may never know who let the dogs out, but I'd bet anything PETA was involved.