furniture making

Writing Desk – Roundels and Straight Moldings

Though a minor piece of real estate on the desk, the roundels were certainly visually prominent.  Thanks to my four-jaw chuck on the lathe making them was a breeze.

My first step was to make a cylinder from some of the mahogany then turn the roundel profile on the end of the cylinder.  Once the profile was satisfactory I scored the lip of the roundel with a turning chisel then sawed off the circular wafer right on the lathe.

I repeated the process until I had excess roundels, then glued them in place.

In addition to the roundels there were bits of applied moldings to the field and bottom perimeter of the writing box and along the edges of the shelf.  After spending numerous hours making the curved moldings on the legs these seemed like a holiday.

I simply cut the moldings on the edges of a board then ripped them off for application to the surface of the box.

The half-round string moldings in the field of the writing box allowed me to use a set of pinch clamps I’d made years before.  These were featured in a Popular Woodworking article some time ago.

The only construction left to accomplish was to complete the top of the desk, then it would be on to the best part — finishing!