Executive desk

[Thomas S Stockton]

I finished this desk and table before Thanksgiving. The design is based very loosely french and italian antiques. The wood is walnut, walnut burl and cherry. It was a fairly intense project, the leather top shown in the picture came from England and turned out to be kinda low quality and the color really didn't harmonize with the walnut. Luckily it was decided to replace before it shipped back to Washington DC. I don't have any pics of the new leather but it was much better quality hide the tooling was crisper and the color looked great. The client is extremely happy.
Tom

[Jim Rimmer]

Beautiful desk!

[Dave Ray]

Nice, Tom, Very nice. I love the combination of materials. The table is special also. Two beautiful projects to end the year. Happy New Year

[lou sansone]

wow
what a great piece . love walnut - it is really the king of woods
excellent work - what did you finish it with?

lou

[Thomas S Stockton]

Hi Could the mods please move this to the correct forum
Tom

[Rick Fisher]

I take my hat off to you.. that is a beautiful desk..

[Michael Peet]

That is gorgeous. Nice job!

Mike

[Bruce Page]

Hi Could the mods please move this to the correct forum
Tom

Done!
Beautiful Desk.

[Mark Stutz]

Beautiful. I really like the combination of Walnut and Walnut Burl. It appears as if the "carcase" is frame and panel, but how do you do the burl on the top part of the legs? Inlay a premade panel? Did you do any of the leather work for the top?

Mark

[gary Zimmel]

That is one beautiful desk Thomas.
The detail is fantastic.
"Fairly intense project" is a bit of an understatement in my books...

Thanks for the post.

[John Keeton]

Very nice work!! I am also interested in the finishing schedule, and a little more detail on the construction technique. Just a superb piece - both style and workmanship.

[Baxter Smith]

Incredible! I know you're not supposed to ask how much something cost but it doesn't stop me from thinking it!:D

[John Thompson]

Outstanding....

[Thomas S Stockton]

Hi all
Thanks for the nice comments and I'll try to answer the questions.
The leather comes oversize and I cut it to size and it is glued down with wall paper paste. I actually spent more time worrying about it than gluing it down. The leather panel is removable since it will be subject to wear and tear and is not as durable as wood.
The finnish is a homemade blend of polyurethane, tung oil and naptha I wipe on 3 coats without sanding between coats, after the third coat I sand and steel wool it really well using 320 grit sandpaper and 4/0 steel wool. The next coats go on much lighter and it will take 3 coats until it looks good. I will steel wool or lightly sand (320) the finish before the final coat. final coat is rubbed out with steel wool and waxed.
I made the inlays on the legs, I made a very simple 4 sided jig that routed a recess for the burl so that it was flush with the walnut surface. I then glued the burl down and when it was dry I routed for the cherry stringing and glued that in place.
The construction looks like frame and panel but it is not. I was worried about the desk sagging so I used 3/4" plywood for a core and veneered the burl to that. I then cut everything to size and applied the walnut that makes up the framing. Once that was dry I did all the molding. All this was fairly time consuming because all the moldings are glued on and were clamped since nailing them down would look cheap.
The legs are a core of sapele that I then grooved out for the cherry, which was mitered and glued in place. I then tapered them and glued down walnut sawn veneer. This got me the basic legs shape I then used a core box bit to make the coves in the leg exposing the cherry again. The next step was to create shoulder that the moldings would bump up against making a clean transition the initial shoulder were cut on the table saw and the I routed out the spaces in between. I then glued and clamped the moldings in place.
A lot of time was spent dealing with the burl it was first flattened and then made into a 2ply with a backer veneer which was walnut. This does a few things it makes the veneer very stable once glued down and it makes it much stronger to work with and you don't need to worry about how brittle and weak burls can be. If you want more info on this I wrote an article for Woodcentral on this it is in the article section of their website or they discuss this a bunch in the forum at Vacupressing systems web site.
Tom