Project Information
These coffee tables are almost identical except for a few details and the wood species. One is made out of solid cherry. The other is white oak. Built in the Arts & Crafts style. The square holes in the top are echoed in the main stretcher below. Breadboard ends add stability and the five-facet tips add visual interest. In keeping with the philosophy behind the Arts & Crafts' movement this piece is built with 48 mortise and tenon joints, four of which are through tenons connecting the arched stretchers to the legs. Ebony plugs on the cherry version have slightly rounded edges and protrude slightly from the adjacent surface. They are housed in shallow mortises. On the white oak version the plugs have been shaped like a pyramid, a detail that was reproduces in the main stretcher. The plugs on the cherry version actually hide screws that connect the breadboard end to the main piece of the top. Screws don't hold very strongly in end grain so wooden plugs were glued in the top's tenons to provide side grain for the screws to bite into. See last picture. On the white oak version I used wooden pegs driven from the underside to keep the breadboards and top tightly together. Finish for the cherry version is a wipe on satin polyurethane over a tinted Danish oil. For the white oak version I used aniline dye, followed by gel stain, followed by wipe on poly. Inspiration for this table came from a similar piece by Kevin Rodel featured in Fine Woodworking magazine #178.
