Reply To: Advice sought: learning how to make well-designed furniture
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I’d advise you to take a step back. You’re very far down a rabbit hole right now. In summary, just build things and you’ll develop a feel quickly. Time spent determining the “perfect” dimensions of a piece cannot be replaced.
Strength of materials is of course important, but is unlikely to be a major concern for you at this time. Most furniture pieces you’re likely to build will use material thickness greater than 1/2″ and usually significantly greater. This is likely to occur because proportionally ultra-thin legs, rails, stiles, etc. look “wrong” to your eye and are “unattractive”.
Additionally, you’re unlikely to buy stock less than 3/4″ thick from a commercial distributor.
Learning to understand grain direction, and how it effects strength, is more important than whether a particular component should be 1/2″ or 5/8″ thick. I suggest buying a copy of “By Hand & Eye” by George Walker and Jim Tolpin. It’s a good introduction to furniture design and drawing.