scrap wood done good

If you have been following me on twitter and reading my blog you will know that I haven’t got any major furniture making to do at the moment for clients or shops so I thought that it would be a good time to try and use up all the scrap wood I have accumulated over the months and also try some new ideas out that have been in my sketchbook for a while now. Most notably desk accessories and oddly, candle holders.
  Now this isn’t my usual bag so to speak as I would much rather be making a nice desk or table but there is only so much furniture a man can make and store! Without being overrun with it all and nowhere for it to go. So turning my hand to something smaller seemed the logical step.
  I have lots of scrap wood lying about from Sapele to American White Oak and the overriding thing that struck me was I wanted to create some objects that did not detract from the overall look of the wood (the grain, pattern, form) so I played around with simple ideas where function was the leading aspect, so the wood stood out.

  As many of you know my favourite tool at the moment is the router. Such a versatile tool and one I have used to great effect in other projects detailed in this blog, so I knew with this tool I could create/change an object without taking too much of the wood itself away. And still leave something unique and usable. So I simply and if I’m honest quickly created what I like to call the fort (because it looks a minimalist castle) it’s a very basic candle holder made from a block of Sapele wood (but any wood could be used) which has a section cut right through it to house, crucially two different types of candles. This was important. I didn’t want such a basic design to be basic in use so having the option of it using normal candles (wedged into the first cut through section) as well as good old tea lights in the second cut through section, gave it a little bit of customisation (see photos). The idea is to have small forts dotted around a table or area, and also long fort sections that house 10 tea lights or more, or a mixture of normal candles in a row to create a modern simple (and a little bit dramatic) light source.

 

 

 

To me this basic design was pleasing to the eye and gave new life to old scraps that I would have never known what to do with. I intend to display this design and its bigger brother on the numerous portfolio websites and then hopefully get it ready to be bought on the great www.stylisticgallery.com