Sometimes a design comes to life very quickly through a few sketches on your notebook and taken away by the momentum of the pen tip, you happily and drastically under-estimate how much time is required for completion. I am way too often guilty of this to still fall in the trap… but here I am. Few months into the making of what I thought was going to be a one, maximum two weeks project. Hopefully, slowly learning to inflate my own time estimates.
I conflated various real-life needs around the house into this design that combines open shelves, a chest and a coat hanger. Nothing ground-breaking, just a combination of things I liked from various inspirations on the internet (slightly tempered by my own skills assessment… although this was still an ambitious undertaking).
These are some notes about the lessons I learned with this hall tree.
You think that making a hole (mortise) on the wrong side of a post is stupid? How about making two of them? Yes, you will be surprised. I was. I banged my head on the wall when I realized I had just chiseled two mortises on the wrong (show) side of a post. I did not have the stock (or the courage) to re-do that whole post from scratch (9 mortises total), so I had to get over it. Fortunately I was able to turn it such that the glaring mistake is in the back of the hall tree, where no one will look… except for me, when I need a reminder of how deep you can dig a hole for yourself.
Woodworking is about learning how to fix your mistakes. (quote?)
I spent four hours patiently painting the hall tree with my persimmon orange milk paint. I was a little underwhelmed by the result that looked more salmon than persimmon. So underwhelmed in fact, that I was going to forfeit the second coat for fear that it would only accentuate the salmony color. Fortunately, I checked my friend Google and learned that the first coat of milk paint is expected to be ugly and the second coat fixes everything. Hurray! It did, indeed, save everything.
Easily the most frustrating part of the whole project was installing hinges for the chest. I thought I had figured things out - alas, at my first try the lid could barely be lifted. Ugh. I am still figuring out if there was a better option that I missed. Learning in progress.
Breadboard ends look so simple. You’ve seen them around. But the reason why they exist and how they are actually made? That was one of the fascinating parts of this build. I learned so much about breadboard ends.