Bathroom Cabinet
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I’ve started a new project. My wife has been bugging me to build a wall cabinet for the downstairs washroom. Her idea is to have enough space in it for both day-to-day storage and for guests if they are staying over for a few days. I have decided to take the bull by the horns and come up with my own design. All the stuff I have ever built so far has been someone else’s design so this will enable me to grow. If I’m honest, the design is a bit of a pastiche of the projects that Paul has so far shared with us but I feel that combining the different elements in the way I intend to is the sort of thing that Paul is pointing us to. Having said that, he may come along and tell me that this project is crap and I’m doing it all wrong but that’s a risk I’m willing to take.
I have done several sketches of different designs and my client ( aka wife) has given the go ahead for her preferred design. I have a couple of lengths of Cherry that I have been saving for a special project and this seems like the ideal project to use them on. They have been sitting in my workshop, gently seasoning away for a couple of years.
Week one was spent in producing full sized plans drawn on lining paper. I then spent an afternoon cutting the timber to length for the parts needed for the main carcass. This used up most of the first plank of Cherry. The doors and the internal shelving will have to come from the second plank. By the end of the first day, I had the parts nearly complete.
Keep Calm and have a Cup of Tea
Part two of my cabinet build:
I had planned on using my P/T machine to bring all the timber down to final thickness but the top and bottom parts were half an inch too wide for the thicknesser (that’s a planer to our US readers). I was therefore forced to resort to hand tools. I was pleasantly surprised at how straightforward the final thicknessing (planeing?) was and how much fun it was. I had a wonderful afternoon spent either planeing the wood or sharpening my plane iron. The wood came out at exactly the right thickness and was flat ant square with no twist at all. OK, I’m working in Cherry but it is definitely food for thought as far as future projects go. It’s very freeing to not be confined to 8″ width of timber.Anyway, once the timber was the correct width and thickness, I set about cutting it to final length and it was here that I discovered that my combination square is no longer square. It is now out by about one degree. Fortunately, I have a spare square but I’m gutted that one of my most treasured tools is now useless to me. After a bit of jiggery-pokery I had managed to plane the ends of eland length of timber square.
Next up was the housing dadoes. I’m basing the joinery of this part of the project on the Wallclock project. By the end of the afternoon the housing dadoes had been cut and the project now looks like the attached photos. Having read about how “hand tool friendly” Chreey is and noting how easy it was to plane, I was surprised at how hard it was to cut these joints. Each one took about 30 – 40 minutes. Still, I got there in the end. Next job is to cut the front of each upright so it sits flush with the back and then to cut the grooves for the back panel.
Keep Calm and have a Cup of Tea
Absolutely *love* cherry. might be my favorite wood (limited experience of course) but to me thus far seems the perfect balance of beauty, workability, strength, grain and affordability. Of course, I live in an area where it is readily available for a very reasonable price; generally around $4/bf and often even lower. Looks like you have some nice bits there that should serve you well.
Nice work so far, cherry is a really nice wood to work with isn’t it. It really darkens up if you put the finished piece in sunlight.
-Canada
I am looking forward to your progress Jon. Someday I will be replacing our store-bought medicine cabinet in our washroom with something more interesting, but I think my client has a list of other things for me to do first… 😉
I would fully disassemble your combo square and clean out the slot in the head and the groove in the blade. Sometimes grime can build up in that slot and/or groove, which can throw things out of whack.
-Scott Los Angeles
Now this is something I will look to follow eagerly. I have an interest in carcass building as it seems to lead to so many other projects. Great skill to have. The cabinet in cherry will look lovely I’m sure Jon!
New Jersey, U.S.A.
Very interesting project. Thank you for posting!
My bathroom cabinet is an old chipboard cabinet… I’ll follow this thread for sure! 😉
hi Jon i’m at the drawing stage for a floor standing bathroom cabinet to replace a shop bought one that was made from mdf it cost £75 and might aswell have been made from weetabix , so i’ll follow this cherry build with interest thanks for posting
Eddy .. Liverpool, Merseyside, UK
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Thanks for the kind comments guys.
I’ve spent the afternoon gutting a groove all round the inside back of the carcase for the rear panel. I then broke out the second board of Cherry and cut the upright parts for the two doors. I’m really starting to appreciate just why people say how great Cherry is for hand tools. I had so much fun milling the rough stock by hand and it was such a great feeling when I got it all flat, square and parallel.
Keep Calm and have a Cup of Tea
Great work!
Nice work so far! How are you planning to mount this to the wall?
-Canada
Looking good. I built one several years ago before I started in the MW classes. I made it with limited knowledge of wood working so it’s a bit rustic to the trained eye (If I can consider my eye trained). But I plan on building another one with my new skills.
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Albert Einstein
Hi Sandy. That looks really nice ( and the cat obviously likes it) 😀
I wanted to do a design very similar to that but my wife vetoed it. For some reason, she’s not keen on the open lower shelf.Dave, at the moment, the plan is to use some sort of cleat but the backup plan is to apply a batten to the rear top of the unit and drill/screw through from the inside. I prefer the cleat as it’s more adjustable.
I milled the stock for the rest of the frame parts for both doors. I was really chuffed when everything came out the same thickness. I’ve started to cut the grooves I need but I’ve run out of time for this weekend. Hopefully now that the clocks have gone forward, I’ll have some time in the evenings to do some work too.
Keep Calm and have a Cup of Tea
I’ve done a little bit more work on my project. The grooves are all cut in the frame parts of each door and I’ve started on the mortise and tenons. My mind is buzzing with so many design ideas at the moment; it feels as if I can’t sketch them fast enough.
Keep Calm and have a Cup of Tea
Half the battle is figuring out what you want it to look like! That is going to look great.
-Canada
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