I recently noticed that it’s been FIFTY YEARS since the musical duo of Richard and Linda Thompson released their heartbreakingly luminous song “Dimming of the Day.”
How did fifty years flash by so fast?
Notwithstanding the dynamics of their marriage and splitting (the breakup was so traumatic that Linda was hysterically mute for a couple years afterward) their seven-album output from 1974-1982 was as good as it gets.
Just more captivating music to listen to while imposing organization of the first (basement) floor of the barn. There are times when having 7,000 square feet of space is not a blessing.
My proof-of-concept panel with the parquetry pattern at full scale. Rendering this was an extremely instructive and useful exercise that changed my approach to every step of the process.
In prepping for the tool cabinet parquetry mock-up — that is as exact as I can make it rather than my previous proof-of-concept — plus the actual parquetry on the cabinet, I was going to need dozens if not hundreds of the diamond units. A task that large is similar to eating an ox. You do it one bite at a time.
Here’s that first bite.
My starting point was cutting hundreds of 30-60-90 triangles both with the grain and across the grain. My veneers were all white oak cut from leftover scraps from the French Oak Roubo Project, and man was it dense. I tried cutting the triangles using jigs and handsaws (that is how I teach introductory parquetry workshops like the upcoming one at Wood and Shop near Charlottesville VA), but soon came to the realization that this ox needed a little prodding.
Given my recent success using my Delta benchtop bandsaw with a fine blade, combined with a new strategy for working the parquetry, I decided to do all the sawing on that little machine.
Soon enough I had two plastic shoebox-sized tubs each filled with hundreds of the slightly oversized triangles I needed for what would come next.
Changed horse #1.
Even though I wasn’t sawing the triangles by hand I was determined to edge plane each one using precise shooting jigs fabricated especially for that purpose. A few dozen of those, especially the ones that are primarily cross-grain, and that determination flagged. I needed a different system if I was to get the ox eaten. That “new system” will be the focus of my next post on the project.
Changed horse #2.
In addition, once I first established the size of the parquetry pattern I created a brass template to make each diamond the perfect size and fit. I was so intent I used trigonometry calculations and a vernier caliper to get the dimensions and angles really precise. (If you ever wondered when you would use what you learned in 11th grade Trig class, now you know.) The frustration of this fussiness soon depleted my enthusiasm for this approach. The alternative I devised will be demonstrated in a post a way down the road.
Changed horse #3.
Stay tuned for “what would come next.”
PS Posting might continue to be sorta sketchy for another little while as grandson #3’s arrival is imminent, and grandsons #1 and #2 have birthdays right on the heels of #3’s introduction to his share of the national debt.
Dr. Elderbarndottir has been a pipe organist since before she could drive, and some of the treasured times of my life were driving her back and forth to the church where she was employed to play. We had precious time together alone talking in the car coming and going, and I got to sit and listen to her practice pieces for worship. They had a small pipe organ and she loved playing it, and would frequently exclaim, “It comes alive!” when she turned on the blower. For a time I thought she might actually go into the business of building and repairing pipe organs. IIRC the pipe organ company offered her such a job even while she was in high school, troubleshooting is just in her veins.
Instead she went off to college, graduating with a Physics BS (summa cum laud; both daughters were HS valedictorians who went on to be summa cum laud in college, proving that Mrs. Barn fit the description when I was in the market for the smartest BabyMomma), although she did continue pipe organ studies her whole time there. Then off to more college for her PhD. She never lost her love for the organ even though she does not get to play much anymore. I too have maintained a longstanding love for the instrument, and this performance and organ are both sublime.
Now that I think about it, pipe organs are about the most complex wood-and-metal things out there. One of the most famous organ builders in the world is just over the mountain from here.
And this is just weirdly wonderful. I think I first learned of this music form from reading Richard Feynman’s autobiographies.
After a very long while of not working on it I have resurrected the (very showy) decorative parquetry aspect of my mondo tool cabinet. I cannot recall exactly where I left it blog-wise and thus presume you don’t recall either. So, let me go back to the start and endeavor to keep the thread going better than before. Although with blizzards, greenhouses, and soon-to-be-three grandsons you never know. My goal is to post every week or so, walking you through my process step-by-step.
The short and sweet re-introduction is that I’m going to use a fancy parquetry composition, one inspired by the works of the Roentgens. Certainly not as fancy as theirs, and definitely not as well executed (they were perhaps the finest furniture-surface-decorators of their time, or maybe of all time [their pictorial marquetry is without parallel in my opinion]).
All of my base veneers were sawn from leftover chunks of white oak from the French Oak Roubo Project, so though the material is not literally contemporary with the Roentgens it does not miss it by much.
Depending on the piece and my mood (or weariness) I used both hand and machine sawing for the task.
The parquetry pattern is a cluster of four 30-60-90 triangles assembled into both swirl and sunburst patterns into diamond shapes, to be used alternately in the final composition. An early sketch and proof of concept confirmed my vision for the cabinet.
Once the veneers were cut into their ~1/8″ sheets I began sawing out the hundreds and hundreds of smaller triangles. These did not have to be particularly precise, and it was more efficient to deal with them ex poste and in the assembly process. So my little Delta bandsaw was the perfect tool to saw a stack of the veneers into the requisite triangles. Hundreds and hundreds of triangles.
At first I thought I would plane the edges of the triangles and created several jigs for that purpose. It turned out to be way more trouble than that was worth, trying to hold on to little pieces of really dense white oak, planing the skew edges. Did I mention that there were hundreds and hundreds of them to do?
I wound up taking a whole different approach, which will be the topic of the next post in this series.
My latest conversation with long-time friend Brian Wilson dropped yesterday on his Now For Something Completely Different podcast. If pungent (but not vulgar) discussion of current events interests you, find it and give it a listen. If not, don’t.
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