Melanie's Bench

[Stretch]

I promised my wife I'd build her some living room furniture some time back. I even bought some wood for the project about two years ago. So, this past week, with my shop being close to "done", I decided to take a break from working on the shop to making a project. The wood was some Eastern Red Cedar and it was telling me it wanted to be a bench. So I built a bench. To make it as rustic as possible, I hand planed all the surfaces to give it that "hand hewn" appearance. The edges still had bark on them so I just took that off with a draw knife. I then sanded all surfaces with 220 just to knock off any splinters. The finish is lacquer. The base is Gemini brand satin lacquer and the top is also Gemini brand, but I hand rubbed it to a satin sheen and waxed it.

Here's the pics:





Thanks for looking.

[Ruffnek]

Shades of Nakashima! That Cedar is gorgeous.

I'll bet that took the heat off for a while, huh?

[dcarter636]

That may be the best use of cedar that I've ever seen. I'm torn between seeing it as Japanese artsy-fartsy or down home comfortable. I realize it's just nature of full width planks, but the sap wood borders command our eyes to focus on the relaxing, softened, natural contours of the edges.

It's just peachy.

[Joe Lyddon]

That's one of the prettiest benches I've ever seen!

That cedar is sure pretty too! ;D

Beautiful job!

[sawduster]

Nice! Ya gotta love the color of that cedar, and like Dave said, keeping the sapwood adds another dimension to the work.

Wonder if you hand chopped the mortises for the stretcher? Might be problematic trying to punch them with a mortiser with the unstraight edges.

[sachbvn]

THAT, is a NICE NICE NICE bench!

It turned out awesome and the cedar looks great!

Zac

[Stretch]

Jan 30, 2010 19:06:44 GMT -6 dcarter636 said:

That may be the best use of cedar that I've ever seen. .

Dave, that's probably the highest compliment I've ever gotten. Thank you. Like I said in my original post, I just kinda let the wood be what it is.

Jerry, I roughed in the mortises with a jig saw and then cleaned them up by had with chisels. Both ends actually split when I was sliding in the tenons to test the fit so I had to glue them back together. I knew Cedar splits easily, but I was still amazed at how little pressure it took.

Thanks everyone for the compliments. It was really nice to build something using my own creativity for a change instead of being stuck to plans produced by a designer.

[sawduster]

Both ends actually split when I was sliding in the tenons to test the fit so I had to glue them back together. I knew Cedar splits easily, but I was still amazed at how little pressure it took.

Yeah, I've experienced that myself a few times. Thank the Lord for Thin CA glue. ;D

[deepsplinter]

I'm a big fan of the free form stuff, and that's probably the best I've ever seen.

Good job, Mark

[boodrow]

Stretch the bence is very nice . I know the wife will love it.
Boodrow

[maverick31]

I agree with the others, it is an outstanding bench. I am sure your wife loves it.

[Doug B]

I really like that Stretch. Beautiful wood, and I love the rustic look. I really like the contrasting colors, and the natural edge is really cool.

Nice job on the bench.

P.S. I really like through tenons too!