A few years ago when I got into woodworking, I decided my first major furniture project would be to build a fireplace mantel. Our home came with a poorly made shelf mantel and some cheap picture frame molding around the fireplace, which neither my wife or I liked. I looked at several designs on the web and used what I liked out of many of the designs. The sketch I made was translated into a CAD file, which I used not only to design the mantel but to create a cut list for actually building it.
Please click the pictures for larger images
CAD Diagram of Mantel
It took me about 6 months working on and off to complete the mantel. It is solid soft maple except for the top panel of the mantel which is birch plywood (I ran out of wood (and money), see below). On the way I learned a lot about rail and stile construction, as well as making raised panels. I learned Home Depot has the lumber you need but it is VERY expensive to get it there. I messed up a few times and had to redo some of the work (for instance, I learned you should always rout the ends or the stiles FIRST!). Went back to Home Depot a few times for more expensive wood. I also had a hard time with learning to use my biscuit joiner, and had to do a few trim cuts here and there. Fortunately, it all worked out pretty nicely in the end. A lot of people don't seem to like the red tile we chose to replace the slate surround, though.
The completed fireplace mantel.
Of course, once the mantel was up it made the two alcoves next to the mantel look really empty. My wife and I talked it over and decided we needed to fill those empty spaces with a pair of built-in cabinets. I came up with a design that would complement the mantel while giving us more storage, a place to put the stereo components, and a place to put our 36" TV set. Again, the sketch was translated to a CAD program, and the drawing used to create a cut list.
CAD diagram of built-in cabinet (TV side)
By now I had learned a few things, built a few smaller project (like Wood Magazine's folding workbench) and had a better idea of what I was facing. I'd also gotten a few more tools -- upgraded my Ryobi BT3000 table saw to a DeWalt 746, got a planer (DeWalt 733) and a jointer (Harbor Freight 7"). The last two allowed me to purchase rough-cut lumber at the lumberyard at a very substantial savings over Home Depot, and gave me control over the shape and thickness of my wood. A better tablesaw with a larger table surface meant larger panels were no longer so difficult to work with.
The completed Entertainment Center at Christmas 2003
I used 3/4" Maple plywood for most of the cabinet parts and shelves, and hardwood for the face frame, doors, edging and trim pieces. (The backs were made from 1/4" Birch because I could not get it in maple at the time I bought the supplies.) Hardware came from Woodcraft and Lee Valley Tools.
The TV Cabinet. The TV sits on a pull-out swivel shelf, there is VHS Tape and DVD storage in the cabinet below. The grate on the bottom is an under-cabinet heater, which replaced about 6' of hot-water baseboard radiators the cabinet displaced. Yes, I have one more shelf to finish.
During construction I used another new tool, the Kreg pocket hole jig, instead of my biscuit joiner. I can't say enough about how nicely it worked, so much so I'm getting rid of the joiner. The Kreg jig was used to build the face frames and to attach them to the cabinets. I recommend it very highly.
A view of the crown molding I made for this project. I is made up of several pieces, the largest was cove-cut on the tablesaw. That's a LOT of sanding!
This project was also my first use of a hand plane, a Record 04, used to fit the face frame into the alcoves after scribing. That was fun, but now I really need to learn how to sharpen planes irons and chisels.
I was fortunate to be able to finish the project before Christmas so the house was back in order for company. (Actually the week before Xmas I spent every moment I wasn't sleeping or at work trying to finish.) Sounds like I made my deadline, right? But I was supposed to have this all done by LAST Xmas (2002). So what if I was a year behind. It finally got done! It only took about 18 months, with some other smaller project done in between.
The finish was recommended to me by a knowledgeable gentleman on the Wood Online finishing forum, whose name I will put up here when I remember it. It consisted of one coat of Boiled Linseed Oil flooded on for 10 minutes and then wiped off, followed by several days of drying time. This was covered by several coats of shellac, which was mixed 3 parts super blonde flakes and one part garnet flakes, in a 2# cut. Applied with a brush it looks well, but sometime this spring I hope to take everything out of the EC and pad ona few more coats to really make it complete.
It was a very big project for me, and I'm very proud of the way it came out. My wife loves it too, and that's what is really important of course.
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