Broken Project Update - Better and No Longer Horrible Enough to Burn

 Just wanted to give an update on this project.  I am making the Paul Sellers Keepsake Box as taught on his MasterClass series.  The angled dovetails and curved sides added some nice complexity into this build.  It became obvious fairly quickly that the first one of these is a practice prototype.  I will likely make at least two more practice versions (most likely out of cherry as I have a lot of scrap cherry or poplar).  Then, I will make the final version as a gift to my wife out of some awesome birdseye maple (found on eBay; will shop there more often for wood) and genuine mahogany.  

The challenge in the first version was I wanted to try it out of a new wood I hadn't really used before and I chose (poorly in retrospect) to use Spanish cedar.  It's a very soft and fragile wood that had a catastrophic crack develop despite careful clamping and dry assembly practice.  Last post I glued up the cracks.  In the comments, Ralph of the Accidental Woodworker had suggested I use inlay to further hide the cracks.  This was an awesome idea and I have done so.  On both the cracked and uncracked sides I used some store bought inlay I had to provide symmetry so it looked like this was intentional from the start.  I used a mixture of small router and chisel to create the grooves and attached the hinges before running up the vertical inlay.  Hide glue and blue tape was used to clamp it all up.  Then, I used a block plane to make all things flush on the curved surface.  I got some parts of the inlay that teared out.  This is frustrating and while I could go ahead and fix that, I am going to call this good enough.  The dovetails, especially on one side, aren't that good.  As such, this is practice piece.  Mostly wanted to use this as an opportunity to practice fixing/hiding an error.  It looks much better than the bad crack.  To that end, I accomplished the goal.  This box will either end up as a gift to my 10 year old, or, will be used in the kitchen to house the packets of sweetener.  

There is still plenty wrong with this box and it is ugly enough where I don't want to put my makers mark on it.  However, it is no longer horrific enough where I want to burn it.  I will say this, fixing a mistake after the fact takes a significant amount of time.  So much so, that whatever extra time one spends avoiding or mitigating risks is probably worth the investment.  Mostly want to get this box finished so I can get ready for a class I'm taking on dovetail making.  The rest of 2022 will be spend on making this style and similar small boxes.  The good news is that I have the wood already in the shop equilibrating for the next few big projects which I should get to in early 2023.  Also looks like I have all the wood I need for 2023 projects.  If not, there shouldn't be a big outlay of cash for more wood.  I've got a hankering to make a full sized jointers (via ATC plans) chest and despite wood prices, the 1x12s in pine wouldn't be that bad of a cost.

Here's the future bird's eye maple.  I have enough for at least two boxes.  Was expensive but will give me/my wife a nice box once I have the skill honed for these tricky dovetails.  The top and bottom will be mahogany.  Of course, any left over scraps of the mahogany will be saved for tool handles, etc.  I have a birdcage awl kit I plan to make so a little nub of this birdseye maple will go a long way.