dice towers I've made Part 2: Electric Boogaloo.

A while ago I posted some dice towers I’ve made(that post can be found here) and I recently got inspired to redo my design and improve the look.

In the first picture from left to right: Virginia Pine finished with Osmo Polyx, Virginia Pine with a water based finish, and Poplar with a satin lacquer

Osmo Polyx is, by far, my favorite wood finish. It gives a smooth, silky surface but running your hand over it, it still feels very natural and really makes the grain of the wood pop. Some finishes end up feeling like they have a plastic coating over the wood.

In my older design the battlements(the “stones” sticking up from the top) were too narrow or non-existent. With the newer design I wanted them to be wider, like they would be on a traditional fortress turret tower. The old design also I had a dowel extending through the staircase and top to help me align it, but I discovered if I fixed the efficiencies of my toolpath on my CNC I could add aligning features without making it take longer and didn’t need to have a dowel sticking out the top.

The doors are something I’m weirdly proud of because it took a lot of revision and trial and error to get it to look right.. I think they really tie the face of the tower together and make it look like a real structure.

Interesting feature of Poplar lumber: if you notice tower the top of the main section of the tower, below the top section, the wood has a sort of green hue to it, while the “stones” around the doorway at the based of the tower a nice dark brown. Poplar lumber starts out green-ish and as it is exposed to sunlight turns a chocolate brown/golden honey color.

The door is that brown color because those sections were outside the board originally and had been sitting in the sunlight for days before I worked on this. Whereas the brickwork pattern was all interior wood, and hasn’t been exposed to enough sunlight yet to turn brown. I usually stick them on the roof of the garage for 3-4 hours in the afternoon and it looks perfect.

Here is a video of the tower in use. The sound of dice being thrown down a flight of stairs is beautiful. Be sure to turn up the volume.

I have an Etsy shop for anyone interested