As I've talked about in past blog posts, in July 2022 I went to the Port Townsend School of Woodworking and took a class by Laura Mays on making small dovetail boxes. It was a fantastic vacation and I learned a lot. I can see improvements in my dovetails and I feel a bit more confident. One of the prior posts goes over the specifics of what I learned. I think a lot of it is to take my time, be patient, and really look at all various parts of a dovetail to make sure something isn't fat/out of square.
For this class, after the first day and a half, the goal was to come up with a box design that we would spend the next three and half days making. Since I drove up from the SF Bay Area, ca. 1000 miles (I wanted to use my tools), I had time to think about this. I knew that I wanted a box to sit next to the box I made earlier in the year that held tea bags as I like a few cups of tea in the am. This second box would hold the little packets of sweetener. I find having a specific application in mind really helps me. Knowing what it would hold helps sort out the dimensions.
Prior to us designing the box, Laura had shown us the nice variety of boxes she had made. They were really well made and creative. In this class one of the things I had wanted to do was get a bit out of my comfort zone. As such, I wanted to do some of the things I had really liked on a few of Laura's boxes. Laura and I chatted and she asked some good questions and had some good points that helped refine the design.
I wanted to have two angles on all four sides of the box, which would be made out of walnut. I wanted the bottom and top to be made from vertical grain doug fir (VGDF). I think it's a pretty wood, would work well with walnut, but, more importantly, Laura said it required sharp tools to work. Challenge accepted. On the top and bottom underside of the VGDF , I would gem them (bevels from four directions.
Why gem the bottom where it won't be seen? I like having something hidden that is nice on pieces that I build. Most of the things I build have something I really like on a non show face. Not completely sure why. However, I really liked the story in the bible where Jesus turns water into wine at the wedding He is attending when they run out. I remember the line in which someone compliments saving the better wine for later in the feast. Normally the best wine is served first because as one drinks, one becomes less able to distinguish good stuff from inferior product and often inferior products were served (or so I was told). Anyway, that Bible story has stuck with me. I also like understatement (lived in the UK for two years and the Brits are fond of understatement). I happen to like it as well. Also, I believe in humility which seems to tie with understatement. Combine all of the above (plus probably a dozen or more subconscious things I don't know about myself) and I like to have "hidden features."
I don't recall all of what we did in the afternoon of day 2 (hopefully I wrote more about it in my blog and I know I have notes so I could go look it up). That night, my family was still on their trip to Victoria on Vancouver Island. As such, I happily sat in the hotel room and drew partial scaled drawings of the box. Laura had suggested we do so in order to work out any kinks. I find it helpful and often do drawings of things I am making so I didn't need my arm twisted.
With that, I was ready to make the box. In the next post, I will talk about the actual construction.
No comments:
Post a Comment