Another Blanket Chest

[Cody Colston]

I've made quite a few of these and they sell about as fast as I can make them.

It's Eastern Red Cedar from logs a friend gave me. I had the logs sawn at a local sawmill and air dried the planks. Finish is a coat of shellac followed by three or four coats of USL.

The bottom is a piece of 1/2" BB plywood covered with 1/4" T&G Cedar.

[David Gendron]

If I can ask, how much do you sale them for?

[Jim Kountz]

Cody, nice chest, love the cedar!!
Good job!!

[glenn bradley]

Lookin' good Cody. Are those finger joints on the feet? Nice touch.

[Kevin Godshall]

Beautiful work! I love the color of the cedar. Very nice.

What bit/process do you use to make the feet? Makes for a very special decorative touch.

[Cody Colston]

Thanks for the comments, guys. I think these chests are my all time favorite project. The fact that they are enjoyable to make and sell well is just gravy.

David, I get $500 for these chests. It takes me about three days to make one and material cost is about $130 plus labor so I don't really make anything. If I was to build them in a production mode I could increase the profit but then it would become too much like work. For me it is simply a great way to enjoy woodworking and supplement my tool budget. :D

Glen, yes those are box joints on the feet. I got tired of trying to glue up tight miters and I like the exposed joinery.

Kevin, to build a box-jointed, coved, bracket foot, I start with two 8/4 x 4 1/2" x 7" Cedar blanks. I cut 1/2" box joints on the tablesaw with a shop-built jig and glue up the 90 deg. brackets. After the glue dries, I sand the outside smooth and flat.

I have a jig and auxiliary fence set-up that I put on the TS where I cove the brackets with the TS blade angled 30 degrees. After coving, I use a pattern and trace the foot profile on the inside, flat part of the bracket. I then saw it out on the band saw and smooth the curves at the OSS. The saw tooth marks left on the cove face are scraped off with a gooseneck scraper and then a 2" OSS spindle is used to sand them smooth.

The bracket feet are glued on the case bottom and three glue blocks added on the backside of each one for strength.

Hope that's clear.

[David Keller NC]

Cody - Desing comment. Obviously if you can sell them as fast as you can make them, than this may be completely irrelevant.

I'd consider reducing the width of the top rail on the front. What you've designed has aspects of two early styles - 17th century paneled chests and 18th century dovetailed blanket chests. Most of these are architectural in nature, and one aspect of architectural pieces is that they usually have wider rails/moldings on the bottom than the top, which lends an air of stability to the piece.

Another idea would be to put three panels across the front rather than two.

[Cody Colston]

Thanks for the suggestions, David. I'll certainly consider them because I'm always looking to improve, even if the chest already sell well.

I've often thought of using three panels instead of two but just became comfortable with the design as is. That's an easy modification and I may even have boards wide enough to avoid a glued up panel.

The rails are currently 3 1/2" wide. How much would you recommend narrowing the top ones?

[Richard M. Wolfe]

Nice work, Cody. I've made a number of cedar chests myself but mine are a much different design than yours. I may try one similar to yours as I want to learn to do bracket feet. I think I agree with the comment of the top rail width.

What are the dimensions of your chests? I don't like to build anything smaller than about 3 1/2' for the amount they hold and that's usually the size I make them. I have built them up to about 5'. I found an interesting thing with mine. When I took an order for one I would get as many requests for four footers as 3 1/2 footers. For the ones built on speculation the 3 1/2' sold ten times as fast as a four foot. Go figure.

[David Keller NC]

"The rails are currently 3 1/2" wide. How much would you recommend narrowing the top ones?"

Cody - That's really tough to say, because a piece always looks differently in photographs than it does in person. Obviously, "in person" is what sells your chests, so that's the important thing.

What you might choose to do is the next time you run a batch of these, make a couple of them with an incremental variation - reduce the width of the top rail by 1/2" on one, and an inch on another one. I'd suggest doing this by lengthening the panels by the incremental amount (1/2" and 1") rather than keeping the panels the same and adding to the bottom rail what you're subtracting from the top. Generally speaking, it doesn't take a whole lot to radically affect the look of a piece.

[Todd Burch]

I would take 3/4" or an inch off the width of the top rail. If you wanted to make a bunch of feet, you could cove a long board, then cut to length, then box joint. A moulder would make short work of that profile.

Looks good!

People are funny. A "cedar" chest doesn't have to be made out of 100% cedar to be effective, but when you show them a 100% cedar cedar chest, they go nutso over it.

[Cody Colston]

Thanks, guys.

Todd, it's good to see you posting at SMC again. You took a bit of a sabbattical after you started that IT job. Your work was always inspiring to me.

Richard, the case dimensions are 42" long x 20" tall x 18" deep, plus the feet and the lid.

Thanks again for the comments and suggestions.

[John Keeton]

Cody, nice work on the cedar chest. I agree on the comments on the dimension of the rails. I think it would help the look a little. Three panels would probably help, as well, but I still like the look of two panels. The key here is that apparently others like them as they are, since they sell well for you.

It's interesting to see regional preferences in wood. Around here, red cedar is common, but I don't see it used much in furniture. Growing up, we had a cedar blanket chest and a wardrobe that my mom used for woolens - but be warned it will yellow white wool.

I am not sure what the going price is now, but not too long ago, I could get cedar, kiln dried, for well under a dollar a foot - seems it was $.75. I haven't checked recently.

[Mark Versprille]

People are funny. A "cedar" chest doesn't have to be made out of 100% cedar to be effective, but when you show them a 100% cedar cedar chest, they go nutso over it.

When they look like this people ought to go nuts over it. I have a mother in law that would perform unspeakable acts with a chest that pretty. But then she is kind of kinky about wood.:D

[Todd Burch]

I have a mother in law that would perform unspeakable acts with a chest that pretty. But then she is kind of kinky about wood.:D

Oh, man... that's just a picture I didn't need today!!!

[Kevin Godshall]

I really like those feet. I've never cut a cove on my TS before, but I think it is definitely something I want to add to my repetoire.

I don't want to hijack this thread, but if someone could point me in the general direction....... Cody's explanation got me started, but if there are pix of the jig or special techniques I would greatly appreciate that knowledge.

[Todd Burch]

Google these forums - tons of posts on how to do it.

[Kevin Godshall]

You mean you're gonna make me work for it? You sound just like my dad!!! ;)

Thanks, I will check into it.

[Eric Roberge]

I have a mother in law that would perform unspeakable acts with a chest that pretty. But then she is kind of kinky about wood.:D


Nice Mark... I just got a visual...



Cody, VERY nice work! I love Cedar!

[chris beserra]

Very inspiring. What type of finish is that?

[Stephen Edwards]

That's a beautiful cedar chest!

[Cody Colston]

Very inspiring. What type of finish is that?

I put on a coat of BLO and let it dry for two weeks (while I was at work offshore). A coat of Zinnser seal coat went over the BLO and then four or five coats of Target Coating's Ultima Spray lacquer over that.

The bottom side of the lid is finished but the inside of the case was left bare to preserve the Cedar smell.

Thanks for the comments, y'all.