Paper Shredder in Disguise

I saw this piece of furniture in a catalog and thought “I can make that”. It’s a small cabinet that hides my paper shredder. This piece started out as poplar since I had plenty left over from building my work shop. But I wanted it to match my existing office furniture which would best be described as a distressed espresso finish. Well, I’m not a finishing expert by any means, so this took some practice.

First, to distress the piece I made a special “tool” to create worm holes. Of course it’s just a bunch of nails pounded into a piece of maple but it worked really well. I learned that you shouldn’t be timid when using it. The holes look large in the unfinished piece, but after the dark stain they disappear somewhat so the larger holes were actually better.

Then I took a V shaped carving tool and checked the edges of the boards. You can see some of this in the final photo. I also used this tool to take a few gouges out of the open areas, always with the grain of the wood.

Then I used a rasp to roughen up the edges where the piece may have been damaged during all the transits across the Atlantic.

And finally I used my random orbit sander to soften all the sharp edges. After hundreds of years of use in the galley of the pirate ship, this piece looks downright worn out.

It’s hard to see most of this in the photos, especially with the dark stain and the shine, but in person it turned out really nice.

Then came the finish. A dark stain just didn’t cut it. I found that a dark mahogany dye gave me the right base color. Then three coats of a garnet shellac added color, depth and age to the piece. And finally, three coats of a semi-gloss poly will keep it from aging any more than it already has :)

I hope you like it.

-- Dan, San Diego, CA