Small bookshelf - WIP

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Pekka Huhta

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I have built a small toilet below the stairs, and thought I could share the WIP photos of a small bookshelf/cabinet I built there. Earlier I posted some photos about the parquet I built to the toiet.

my-first-try-on-parquet-flooring-t49326.html

I wrote the story originally in Finnish and was very lazy on the translation, so please feel free to ask if I have forgotten to explain something.

I had made dozens of CAD drawings when I designed the cabinet, but fortunately my CAD version changed and for some reason I could not get the drawings opened any more. So the 1:1 drawing below was the only drawing I had to uild the shelf, rest of it was just made by eye.


I started from two avout 70 cm wide 50 mm oak planks. I re-sawed and planed them and then took them home. It took me two days to match the boards for each use: bookmatched pairs for doors etc. Only after I had chosen these I returned to the workshop and planed the boards to right thickness.





It all began by dovetailing the frame together. It had been ages since I last made a decent dovetail, so I had to practice first.


The shelves are just dadoed in the frame. On the frame it was easy to plane the dado all the way through, but the dados on the divider between bookshelf and cabinet had to be stopped on one end.



The joint between the vertical divider and the lowest shelf was a bit more challenging.


Next I glued the doors from just two bookmatched boards for each door. I thought of adding some horizontal supports behind the door, but then just added a tongue-and-groove joint in the middle, as the boards are just perfectly quartersawn stuff and it's unlikely that they would twist.



The facade of the cabinet was fixed with "loose tongues", so that I planed a groove both to the frame and the back of the (wassitsname, the "facade") and used a batten as the loose tongue.



Finally was time for the final assembly of the frame


Secret behind the odd holes on the pocture above was that I wanted some sort of a contrast to the oak cabinet. Just forged iron nails would have been a bit too rustic, so I decorated the joints with oak pegs, stained black with vinegar+iron stain.



When the frame was ready, it was time to build the back wall to the cabinet. I would usually settle for birch plywood, but with this piece I definitely had to have something nicer. I had 12 mm thick pine boards from my boatbuilding years. I sawed the "fat" out from the edges, planed tongues and grooves on the edges, added a small V in the joints to hide any signs of movement and then pegged the boards to the frame with thin wooden egs. These were used so that the boards would not split, pegs allow more movement than naills.



Then it was time for the small cabinet door. Pretty straightforward, only problem was making the groove for the glass door in the curved surface.




As you can see, the parts for the door were oversized and cut to length only after assembly.

To be continued...

Pekka
 
I had never done any Tiffany glass work, only glazed a few dozen windows. But as the design was intended to be some sort of an Art Nouveau-pastisse, I decided that I'll have to have a glass door there. So I built one small practice piece before I started designing the glass door - just to know what to do and what to avoid.

I had to build a frame of the same size as the door itself and then I just started cutting the glass, taping the edges and then soldering all of it together. I fixed the glass to the door with just a few glazier's points (tacks, added with the stapler-looking thingy that old fashioned glaziers use) and linseed oil putty.



Last thing was to make the boxes. again, first a prototype joint...


...And then to the actual boxes. The bottom of the box was 6 mm thick pine board, sides probably poplar or some other pretty soft wood and the fronts oak.



Then the usual dovetailing job.






Last thing was to install the hinges, handles and tuning all up. It was difficult to find proper hinges, so I took some solid brass hinges (butt-ugly but made from good brass), filed and polished them and then patinated them to look old.

Finishing was another story. I tried a good amout of different alternatives from ammonia fuming to different oils aand waxes. The best result was to put a coat of raw linseed oil, three coats of Rustins Danish oil and two coats of Fiddes Antique Brown wax.


...to be continued

Pekka
 
OK, then the final pics from the completed shelf. You have to remember that this is not a palace, so the only way to get decent overall picture is to step out of the door. The wall was built between two 7x7" beams, so I had exactly seven inches of waste space there - that was the whole idea of the bookshelf. Behind the bookshelf you can see a rattan radiator cover and the panelling in the back wall is there to hide a small door which leads to the "Harry Potter bedroom" (or, in this case the Librarian's bedroom, in case I'm able to hire a librarian there :) )


It's very difficult to photograph the grain of the oak, but here you can see the bookmatched grain in the doors.


a detail of the drawers and the joint between the vertical divider and shelf. If course a butt joint would have been just as good, I just wanted to add a small trick there.



As mentioned, the glass door was fixed with a few tacks and linseed oil putty. You can also see the door stoppers and supports for the glass shelf, both carved from oak and stained black.



I like the "sunrise" figure in the wood. It looks like it moves when you walk past it.


That was it. I still have to build a small stand for the washbasin. Taht will also include a frame for the mirror on the wall, and a small ceramic tiling as a splashback behind the basin. Maybe more on that later...

Pekka
 
I really like that it. Nice to see a work in progress and that is a handsome piece of furniture.
I like the shape of that stained glass window and its impressive to see a multi skilled project such as this.
Brill!!
Owen
 
I love the bookcase and the real books (I still have a few nice old books but the kindle has trumped the clutter of paperbacks - much to the chagrin of my publisher neighbours :oops: ).

One question - Why hide your beautiful parquet flooring with a rug?!

H.
 
That's the sort of woodwork I really love - good timber, hand tools, original design - excellent all round. Every toilet needs a bookcase!
 
Thank you all for the kind words. It was fun to build the bookcase, but the whole process took about half a year as I had many other projects going on at the same time. And frankly, there were moments when I just stuffed the parts somewhere and waited for intuition. Had I been writing a book those moments would have been called a writer's block, so maybe this time it could be called a builder's block :D

Many people have asked me why I hide the parquet. I just think that the whole place looks less like a toilet and more like a real room (or a library:) ) with a carpet on the floor. And secondly the tiny hand-knotted persian carpet feels great under my toes on cold winter mornings, a feat that can't be overlooked at when it's -25 °C outside. :wink:

Pekka
 
Superb job and great pictures. Very good to see all the handy work.

In the last picture, what are the four, black, diamond heads of? Are they heads of something or just decoration?

They look like forged nail heads to me - but then they would .... :)
 
The diamond heads are both pegs to lock the joint and decoration. Carving and staining the pegs was shown on the end of the first message in the thread. They are just lock pins with a diamond carved in as a decoration.

The joints behind those pegs are similar as can be seen on the image below, at the door frame level:



I wanted the cabinet to have some sort of arts&crafts or art nouveau style in it, and that kind of pegs would fit in fine to the Finnish version of those stylses.

Pekka
 
Hi Pekka...how are you doing mate!?

Do you know...since the first time you showed your tool making I have loved the look of your workshop and tools and my other love is Charles Rennie Mackintosh!

So to combine one of his iconic designs with this project is a stroke of genius indeed!

You have a real flare for design...a nice piece of functional furniture which is, in itself a work of art!

Bravo my friend! =D>

Jim
 
I'm getting used to seeing very impressive work in here, but for me it was quite a "Wow" moment when I scrolled down to where you start making the glasswork too ! Deeply impressed.
 
jimi43":33oycu1c said:
Hi Pekka...how are you doing mate!?

Do you know...since the first time you showed your tool making I have loved the look of your workshop and tools and my other love is Charles Rennie Mackintosh!

So to combine one of his iconic designs with this project is a stroke of genius indeed!

You have a real flare for design...a nice piece of functional furniture which is, in itself a work of art!

Bravo my friend! =D>

Jim

Hi Jim,

You are too kind - no geniuses around here. The original idea for the glass door was three tulips, to expressly avoid the iconic rose. The first try I had for glasswork was just one tulip, but my friends were teasing me and telling it looked hugely phallic. So, to avoid future giggling in the toilet I ended up with the rose which was a kind of a pity. But it brought the design back to its roots: the whole idea for that toilet and the design lines started a few years ago when I was visiting Glasgow and saw Macintosh's work over there.

But if I stole the glasswork from Macintosh (or in fact Mary MacDonald, his wife who designed the rose), next I'm going to steal from Alphonse Mucha. The splashback behind the basin will be just one large ceramic tile. I have already agreed with a tile factory that I'm building a mold for them and they'll bake an art nouveau tile for the splashback. I already have a vision of the figures in the tile (lots of whiplash curves, a few odd flowers here and there and bright, thick glaze over everything) but Alphonse hasn't yet told me how to put them all together. :D

While I'm waiting for the inspiration to continue with the tile, I try to finish a few other projects tht have been going on for a long time. In fact Jim, I am currently waiting for you to complete the infill project so that I can start my own infill thread :wink: Here is a little teaser from yesterdays casting session:

infill_valu.jpg


Pekka
 

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HA! Pekka...Andy...

What Andy is referring to is our little "Bristol Design" project whereby I ask Charles at Bristol Design for some raw castings and Andy picks them up and posts them since they don't accept credit cards.

Andy reports that the larger of the two that I reserved was 2mm short in width so they are sorting through the castings to see if they have an oversized one which I can mill down to size.

Otherwise I might be commissioning one! It has to mill down to 67mm width minimum.

I am intrigued by sand casting...always a bit magic in my opinion!

The UK Infill project will resume once I have cut my teeth on the Scottish infill which is proving a little bit...um...challenging.

I should have the remaining stages finished on that mid-week...so watch out for that (warts and all!)

Cheers mate

Jim
 
jimi43":1trattty said:
Andy reports that the larger of the two that I reserved was 2mm short in width so they are sorting through the castings to see if they have an oversized one which I can mill down to size.

Otherwise I might be commissioning one! It has to mill down to 67mm width minimum.

I am intrigued by sand casting...always a bit magic in my opinion!

Mine are only 63 mm wide, so no help over here. And I just used my last bucket of coal to cast those two.

But commissioning the cap iron is a brilliant idea. I'm not able to do ceramic tiles, but I can always make the mold. Just the same way you should just as well make the pattern for your lever cap. Of course Bristol design can make one for you, but making it yourself would really make the lever cap "yours" instead of just something that's ordered for you. It took me about two hours to file that pattern you can see on the photo, so it's really a no-brainer with your skills with the file.

I was thinking of commissioning the glasswork on the cabinet when I saw someone selling her tiffany-works on christmas market last year. I'm really glad that I didn't as it was a very satisfying job to do. Sand casting isn't any more difficult, but getting yourself all the gear for just one cap iron hardly makes any sense.

Pekka
 
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