Barrister Style Bookcase Part 1

My wife has been asking me to build her a bookshelf for some time. Her book collection hit a critical mass so I decided it was time to build her a bookcase. As I am still early in my path into woodworking and on a budget I decided to use plain sawn white oak and oak plywood. Looking back I wish I had sprung for the quarter sawn white oak, next time I'll just wait until I get the wood for the project.

Another mistake I made was failing to take process pictures so I'll see what I can show from the finished product. I'll start off with the big picture and zoom in. the project was a barrister style book shelf with two shelves. The finished product is 4 feet wide and about 2 1/2 feet tall. The doors, sides and back are frame and panel construction. I roughly based the project off a bookshelf I saw in the January 2010 issue of Wood Magazine (awesome magazine by the way). I used 1/4" thick acrylic in the doors to increase durability so I hopefully won't need to replace it in the future.



I thought it would hold all her books...maybe I should come back to reality. This doesn't even show the piles of books in the other room.



That's it for part 1, part 2 will be the details.

This is a new area of woodworking for me as I have only had my lathe for a few months now. Thought I would share some of the pens I've been making in the recent months. So far I've made two dozen, half of which have already made their way into circulation. Pens are great if you want instant gratification. They don't take much time and you can go from raw material to finished product in one session. I know what everybody's getting for Christmas this year.

This is the pen I carry with me, the wood is maple burl that was injected with blue dye, the hardware is chrome.


These pens are actually made from the same piece of wood, it really shows off the variations you run into. These were injected with two dye colors, red and black. The hardware on both pens is gold plated.


This pen is a curly maple. This pen has a simple look about it and it oddly feels like a tough leather.


This figured mesquite was took a while to complete. This wood is hard as rock but the figuring looks brilliant on the final product.


That's it for today. I can't wait to get back in the garage and make more.

Things to come...

This is the beginning of my blogging future.

The wife gently nudged me to post a blog about one of my favorite hobbies, woodworking. My favorite items to make are furniture, I particularly like the craftsman style and am continuing to learn more about it. Being from southern California there are plenty examples of craftsman architecture and furniture for me to be inspired by. But since my house can only hold so much furniture, I also make smaller things too, pens, boxes etc., to give as gifts.

Stay tuned for more, I need to break out the camera and get some good pictures, because if anybody reading this is like me, they just look at the pictures anyway.