Small Table

[Mike Henderson]

A woodworker friend of mine passed away a few years ago. Recently, his wife contacted me to ask if I could make a small table for her. She and her husband had purchased a piece of pietra dura on a vacation and she wanted it set into the top of the table. She was very specific and wanted the table 23 inches tall, about 16 to 17 inches wide and with cabriole legs.

When her husband passed away, she gave me several boards of macadamia tree wood. They had a very large macadamia tree in their yard and when they took it down, her husband sawed it into pieces a bit over 1 inch thick and stickered it in the attic. It was very dry by the time I got it.

I had some challenges in building the table. One was that I had only a limited amount of wood and there was no way to get more. Second, the wood was only about 1 inch thick after I did the stock preparation so I had to glue it up to make the legs. Shaping the legs was a lot of manual work with spokeshaves and rasps after roughing it out on the bandsaw. Insetting the pertra dura into the top was also a bit of a challenge.

Macadamia wood is not too bad to work with. It had a not unpleasant odor when working it and it's not too hard. When it came to finishing, the wood is subject to splotching so I had to seal it with dewaxed shellac before I could put any stain on it. It's finished with water borne lacquer (Target EM6000).

Mike

2022-10-18-Macadamia-table-01.jpg 2022-10-18-Macadamia-table-02.jpg

[Bill McNiel]

Mike, as always, nicely done.

[glenn bradley]

She’s a beauty Mike. Love the leg shape.

[John Ziebron]

Beautiful Mike. Did you steam bend or laminate the aprons? The pietra dura appears to be proud of the wood surface. Can it be popped out for cleaning?

[Robert L Stewart]

Beautiful, love the grain. It's a bit like cherry

[Mike Henderson]

Beautiful Mike. Did you steam bend or laminate the aprons? The pietra dura appears to be proud of the wood surface. Can it be popped out for cleaning?

The aprons are brick laid and then bandsawed to the curve. Then I applied a 1/16 inch shop sawn veneer of macadamia. I used two 10mm dominoes to attach each side of the apron to the legs. The cut on the aprons is 45 degrees where they attach to the legs. Made it easy.

The pietra dura is proud for two reasons: (1) the wood of the top is only so thick. If I inset it so that it would be flat, I'd have a very thin bottom, and (2) the pietra dura has a profile on it. If I inset it so that it would be flat, there'd be a channel around the pietra dura. I talked it over with my friend and she gave approval for me to do it that way. It can be removed. The question is whether it should be glued in. If some one ever knocked the table over, the pietra dura would fall out and maybe break. I'll ask her if she wants it glued in.

Here's a picture of the table upside down. I made a couple of the apron pieces from poplar since I was conserving the macadamia and it didn't matter since they won't show.

Some of the macadamia had a lot of knots in it. That black line you see on the bottom of the top had been a small dead branch that was covered as the tree grew.

Mike

2022-10-18-Macadamia-table-03.jpg

[Mike Henderson]

Beautiful, love the grain. It's a bit like cherry

It's fairly light without any finish on it. I did put a stain on it to darken it up a bit. For finishing, it is like cherry and will splotch.

Here's what it looks like without any finish.

Mike

2022-10-18-Macadamia-table-04.jpg

[Mark Rainey]

A distinctive table Mike. Well done.

[Mike Allen1010]

Beautiful job Mike, I love the proportions and symmetry of the curve of the legs relative to the top. The inlet pattern piece on top is also great.

More importantly what a terrific way to honor a fellow woodworker than building something for their spouse out of a piece of lumber they personally sourced. My compliments – well done on many levels!

[Brian Tymchak]

Great work Mike and a great story to go with it. Congrats!