Bob Easton

The drawers are straightforward and use common techniques. Such as, the sides joined to the fronts with half-lapped dovetails, and the floor being 1/4 inch plywood fitted into grooves. Less common is the extended length to the sides, which allows the drawer to be pulled out enough to give full access to the interior, yet have the tails keep it within the chest. Also a bit different is the back piece fitted into a housing joint and secured with wedged through tenons.

To my eyes, “grain matching” worked out well. I cut the top front of the chest and the upper drawer front, side by side, from a section of lumber Then, I found the lower drawer front from grain running at the same angle immediately adjacent in that board. It was as much careful planning as it was happy accident to have this distinctive angular grain pattern running through that board. By the way, all lumber in this chest is some sort of mystery pine from the big orange store.

You can already see hardware mounting holes in the fronts of the drawers. The chest will end up in a place that doesn’t have room for drawer pulls that protrude very much. I chose drop ring pulls for the drawers and quickly settled on the “antique bronze” finish. That was probably a mistake, because now I was on the hunt for matching finish for the other parts. After tedious wandering through the hinterlands of the internet I gave up on finding larger, rectangular, “antique bronze” drop handles for the sides. I actually found some, but they looked like wilting lilies and their $3 per pair cost signaled they were probably junk. I compromised with some “antique bronze” bin pulls from the big orange store. The hinges come from yet another source and are yet another shade of “antique bronze.” Yet, they are very sturdy and happily the pair is actually the same size.

Next, a bizillion coats of shellac.

The top and bottom use frame and panel construction. The dimensions, 19 inches by 12 inches, are at the small end of needing this type of construction for managing wood movement. Yet it was fun to do them this way.

The long rails were intentionally left over-long. Those tails sticking out were very practical for knocking the frame apart while fitting the pieces. And thanks to the previously mentioned mortise and tenon helpers, there was very minimal fitting needed.

The bottom panel is simple 1/4 inch plywood, and the assembly is glued and screwed to the carcass. The screw holes get plugged. The top uses raised panels, shaped from 5/8 inch thick material. The assembly is only glued to the top of the carcass. Instead of the full bull-nose that Paul Sellers prefers on his chests, I used a less severe round over.

After the glue set, the lid is freed from the rest of the chest by sawing all around. The task looks scary, but was frighteningly easy. ( I had just sharpened that 150 year old Richardson saw. ) A few swipes with the plane cleaned up the kerf marks with minimal loss of material.