My first "Made By Hand" project

[Chris Griggs]

Hello my fellow Neanders. I just finished this cabinet that was inspired by the project entitled "Ain't No Feathers 'Round Boys..." in Tom Fidgen's book "Made By Hand". I know, I know there's a separate forum for projects, but given that this was a Neander build, this seemed like a more appropriate place to post.

While the basic design is very similar to Mr. Fidgen's, I adapted it to be a jewelry cabinet for my fiancee. The cabinet is a combination of walnut (door and drawer fronts), soft maple (the carcass) and pine (back panel and drawer sides). The right side has a rotating 6 peg hanger made by Brusso for hanging necklaces. The left side, which is for earrings, has brass jewler's wire strung across it, attached to a brass eye screws. The finish is Tried and True Original, which I have fallen in love with and highly recommend.

With the exception of a power drill (I have since gotten a Miller Falls egg beater), everything was done with hand tools. I started with S2S lumber so the prep work wasn't too extreme but I still had to reflatten all the face and joint all the edge with my No. 6.

This is also the first project in which I've used dovetails (after many months of practice). The funny thing is, going in to this build, I thought the dovetails would be the most challenging part. Well, the dovetailing went quite well, and it was seemingly simpler things (i.e fitting/joining the interior of the cabinet) that proved to be the bigger challenge. It's been said before and I'll say it again. Cutting dovetails is overrated. Don't get me wrong, they're a beautiful, strong joint, and can be challenging to get right. However, if this project taught me anything its that there are plenty more, equally difficult and more important skills in woodworking.

Anyway, just thought I'd share. My humble thanks for checking out my work. If you have Tom's book I would highly recommend taking on any of the projects. I think he put a lot of thought into picking projects that will help build specific skills and really bring one's woodworking to the next level.

[Robert Culver]

Great looking cabnet. Congrats on a job well done.

[Will Boulware]

Very nice looking! Love the wood choice and contrast!

[David Weaver]

Very well executed, Chris.

[Rick Mellin]

That's a great looking cabinet, nice job on the dovetails. I'll bet you had fun with that hardware. I just purchased that book last weekend and I'm having a hard time putting it done.
Rick

[Chris Griggs]

Thanks guys! I wasn't sure about using contrasting woods at first, but I like the way it turned out.

David, I was hoping you'd take a look. That No. 18 block plane I got from you was EXTREMELY useful to have on this build.

[george wilson]

That is a nice job,especially for a first effort. Why the different # dovetails on the 2 similar drawers?

[Phillip Ngan]

Nice job Chris. Did you find positioning the knife hinges one of your other challenges? Also, nice job on the carcass dovetails.

[Chris Griggs]

That is a nice job,especially for a first effort. Why the different # dovetails on the 2 similar drawers?

thanks George! The different number of dovetails was just to create visual interest,and also to experiment. This is something that Tom Fidgen does on some of his projects that I like. He described his original design of the cabinet as being "whimsical" and I wanted to maintain some of that feeling.

I will say that in that same vain I experimented with varying the sizes of the tails on the carcass (not sure if you can tell that the center one is bigger). This was a design choice that I probably wouldn't do again as I prefer the symmetry of evenly spaced pins and tails.

That's a great looking cabinet, nice job on the dovetails. I'll bet you had fun with that hardware. I just purchased that book last weekend and I'm having a hard time putting it done.
Rick

Thanks Rick! The hardware was fun, but definitely pricey. I actually have a few more single brass pegs that I may hang on the inside of the door, but I am still deciding if there's enough room in there to actually making added pegs useful. The pegs will fit just fine, but what I failed to take into consideration in the building process is whether or not the door will have room to close if necklaces are hung on it.

And yes, it is a great book. Not the best in terms of step by step instruction, but what I found is that once I started the build the reasoning behind the design and the skills it was meant to build became very apparent.

[Chris Griggs]

Nice job Chris. Did you find positioning the knife hinges one of your other challenges? Also, nice job on the carcass dovetails.

Thanks! The knife hinges were challenging, but like the dovetails, I was expecting them to be difficult. I took a lot of time with them and while the mortises weren't as clean as I would have liked I really didn't have too many problems getting them to fit.

Believe it or not the thing that gave me the most trouble was aligning the dowel holes I used to join the interior components of the carcass to the sides. The funny thing is I chose to use dowels because I wanted that part of the build to be quick an easy. The original design called for a sliding dovetail which I didn't feel equipt enough to do. Strange how sometimes the simple things can cause the most trouble.

[Don C Peterson]

That's a fine looking cabinet. Nice job.

[Tony Shea]

Believe it or not the thing that gave me the most trouble was aligning the dowel holes I used to join the interior components of the carcass to the sides. The funny thing is I chose to use dowels because I wanted that part of the build to be quick an easy. The original design called for a sliding dovetail which I didn't feel equipt enough to do. Strange how sometimes the simple things can cause the most trouble.

That's funny, I was going through this thread thinking the whole time to ask how you joined the interior dividers in the case. I was kinda hoping you used a dado or tounge joint of some sort and how you accomplished it using hand tools. But you answered me before I made it all the way through the post. I am actually going through a similar build except a little larger scale and with a Krenov style raised panel door. I have been chopping the case dovetails for the past couple of evenings. Your project has become a nice inspiration for me especially in terms of hardware. I was thinking of using either the carousel necklace hanger or line the necklace section with the single brass Brusso pegs. Is the carousel worth the money and would you chose to use it again? Are the pegs of decent quality? I'm sure both must be of reasonable quality as Brusso hardware tends to be nice stuff. Oh, one more question.... What size ball catch did you use for the door and what thickness is the door? Thanks a bunch for sharing your experience and very nice work.

[Trevor Walsh]

Hey Chris,
Nice case, I do like the way Tom does dovetails, I agree with you too that differing sizes on the case throw the eye a bit. But the bottom "5 tail missing the 3rd" looks really good. The face/end grain contrast is nice. You'll have to let is know in practice how the pulls play out, but they look a little small in proportion to the overall drawer front. In any case, good work!

As a further aside, I endorse "Made by Hand" too, it's got great photos and a really nice conversational/philosophy of woodwork in it.

[Stephen Cherry]

Nice one!!

[Chris Griggs]

Wow! Thanks again for the compliments and the input. I really appreciate everyone taking the time to look and comment.

That's funny, I was going through this thread thinking the whole time to ask how you joined the interior dividers in the case. I was kinda hoping you used a dado or tounge joint of some sort and how you accomplished it using hand tools. But you answered me before I made it all the way through the post. I am actually going through a similar build except a little larger scale and with a Krenov style raised panel door. I have been chopping the case dovetails for the past couple of evenings. Your project has become a nice inspiration for me especially in terms of hardware. I was thinking of using either the carousel necklace hanger or line the necklace section with the single brass Brusso pegs. Is the carousel worth the money and would you chose to use it again? Are the pegs of decent quality? I'm sure both must be of reasonable quality as Brusso hardware tends to be nice stuff. Oh, one more question.... What size ball catch did you use for the door and what thickness is the door? Thanks a bunch for sharing your experience and very nice work.

For the interior I would have liked to use a dado (or even a sliding dovetail) but I didn't haven't the hand tools to feel comfortable pulling it off, and refused to use my tailed router on this project. I got an LV router plane midway through the build, but I had already done the doweling so it was too late to make a hand cut dado. Next project I do like this I will definitely attempt a hand cut stopped dado.

Regarding the hardware the carousal worked well for me because of the small size of the cabinet. Its a very well made piece of hardware (as is all Brusso hardware I've used) and I would use it again. However, I also ordered 4 of the single brass pegs and if I were making a larger cabinet like you I'd probably use them instead. The single pegs are a good bit larger than the pegs on the carousal, and therefore better if one wants to hang multiple chains on a single post. The carousal is smaller then I expected and seems like it will get crammed and crowed with necklaces fairly quickly. Finally the ball is catch is the 1/4" and the door is about 5/8" thick but chamfered down to about 1/2" at the edges. I actually want to leave the door thicker so the the chamfers would be more pronounced but it's a glued up panel and by the time I got it flat I'd taken it down to about 5/8".

You'll have to let is know in practice how the pulls play out, but they look a little small in proportion to the overall drawer front..

Trevor, they seem to work fine, but choosing pulls that were in the correct proportion was definitely hard for me. Honestly, I wasn't and am still not sure what the best size would be. I was originally going to use some small, round, flush pulls, but I was worried they'd be to big for given the size of the drawers. Instead, I went for the smallest peg style pulls I could find. Thanks for your thoughts. Hardware proportions are definitely something to consider carefully on every project