Jul 28

African wood-themed bedside table

African wood-themed bedside table

Bedside table is done!!

@tamarynart told me a couple weeks ago that she wanted a little table to replace the tiny stool that had been next to her side of the bed. It had to fit between the closet door and bed. She picked the padauk for the top (which roughly matches her ginger hair). Since she grew up partially in South Africa (her whole mom’s side is there), and the padauk is African, I decided to do something a little special for the drawer face. The wood is African stinkwood, which I talked about at length in the Jasper Family intarsia post. It’s from a chair my South African mom-in-law @sledv_life_rocks bought in the 70s. The pieces I have are small, so I glued up a couple with a walnut strip in the middle. The pull was hand-carved – intentionally rough and faceted. The base is walnut I got on clearance. The drawer was made from a really old 2×4” I found in our basement when we moved in (probably from the 50s). It will soon be graced with a small Qi-charging/USB lamp

Jun 04

Flower jewelry bowl from walnut

Flower jewelry bowl from walnut

I carved this little jewelry bowl from a walnut cookie I cut from a piece of firewood (found on the side of the road in my neighborhood). I made this on a whim just to have a little something to carve on while enjoying the weather. It’s intended as a temporary bowl for when @tamarynart takes off her earrings in the living room. Which is often.
Carved with a handful of chisels, gouges, and at least 6 different @saburrtooth burrs. I also did a fair bit of pyrography on it, but you can really only see it when you look closely. Finished with @odiesoil.

Sep 24

Frame for AT-AT Watercolor by Julia Werts – Daniel D. Brown, 2018

I acquired a gorgeous silhouette painting of the AT-AT scene from Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back by Julia Kim Werts of The Paintbox Letters. This will be hanging in my geeky Star Wars-themed shop bathroom (see the instagram post below for a video of the bathroom). I built this quick and simple little frame using a couple of scrap pieces of walnut that were mostly bark (cutoffs from someone else’s king bed build). I managed to get just enough wood for the frame.

We have a tiny bathroom next to our shop/garage that is pretty much only used by me when I’m covered in sawdust. I started hanging a couple of my Star Wars artworks and the watercolor by @tam_a_ryn. Then one day I said “hey Honey, how would you feel if I just totally geeked out and made this a Star Wars room? I mean I’m the only one who ever sees it!”. Being the awesome wife she is, she was totally on board 🙂

Sep 11

Bandit’s Dog Bowl Display – Daniel D. Brown, 2018

Our aging pup Bandit has collapsing esophagus (due to the weakening of the cartilage rings in his throat due to old age). This makes it more difficult for him to drink when tilting his head to the ground. So I built this stand with a couple of random pieces of walnut and cherry I had lying around (which I milled myself from neighborhood trees). These were also the first hand-cut dovetails I’ve ever attempted. They could be better, but I’m pretty happy with how it turned out.