Reason I dont build 'furniture'

[Lee Koepke]

ESPECIALLY for the house ..... ever since we moved in 6 years ago, the storebought metal TV stand was 3/4" wider than the space between the hearth and wall, so I have stared at a cold metal/glass concoction that sat at an odd angle. Finally, I decided to build something.

Spent about a year 'prepping' the wife, asking leading questions (getting ZERO feedback) ... I just built something. Spent several hundred on materials, slides, hardware ... got 95% done and she saw it downstairs and went :confused: ..... another 8 months as a makeshift table for collecting tools and junk, I decided to get it out of my way.

Ultimately, I need to build a different top (I took a gamble with a short dimension that didnt pay off) ... now everything's hooked up and she said "it just looks so boxy over there now"

Frustrating :mad::mad:

[Larry Edgerton]

My wife loves everting I make, its me that is my worst critic.

I gave her a rough in on a reproduction one room schoolhouse for christmas. She loves it but I wish I had...........

[Raymond Fries]

Sorry your project did not turn out as desired and good luck with the new top. If she does not reqpond to leading questions, maybe you should ask the wife to "help" design the project. Leading questions have not always worked for me and I have just asked for her "Help" to make sure the project is a good fit. She loves to help with design ideas pick out the wood and be a part of the outcome. We usually get something very nice with a meeting of the minds.

However, she is not ready to help with the tools. LOL

Hope you get it fixed up so she like it!

[Lee Koepke]

Thx ... this seemed like a good venue to 'vent' ... She has a real tough time visualizing final products, even with 3D drawings. The fact remains, its upstairs, its gonna stay for awhile, and MY shop now has room for my bandaw !!!

[Bruce Page]

I have read drawings/prints all my adult life so I can instantly visualize. My wife on the other hand has a hard time. I started taking her through furniture stores to get her opinion on style, size, and proportion. It has worked well for us.

[Raymond Fries]

Get the bandsaw quickly before the space gets filled! LOL

[Bryan Morgan]

Thats why I always force my wife to give me input. "Hey, I'm building this, how do you want it to look?" If she says she doesn't care, well, there you have it. No complaining about it later, I won't listen. :)

[Mike Cutler]

Lee

My wife has excellent vision, but it's hard for her to convey it too me, or visualize the actual final spatial relationship.
I used a combination of cardboard, 1/4" MDF and blue painters paint to "fab" a mockup on our last project. I pretty much built the model as we go. It may take an extra day or two, but it will save you a ton of work on the back end of a project.

We just finished a granit top bowfront vanity for the bathroom that incorporated the leg design from the Macintosh "Music Salon Table". The mockup was in the bathroom for awhile so that we could "get a feel for it", and change dimensions as necessary.
I've learned that my wife likes curves, not geometric squares and rectangles.
Mockups are the way to go.;)

[Heather Thompson]

Lee

+1 on the mockup. I really want to see what I am shooting for before investing in good materials and spending 100+ hours on a project. Wasting good hardwood and time versus a few hours with cheap pine, cardboard, MDF is the way to go IMHO.

Heather

[Bonnie Campbell]

My late husband wasn't a woodworker by any stretch of the imagination. He built some tables for my shop that I just smiled, hugged him and said Thank You! Were they what I really wanted? No, but he put that one ingredient in to it you can't deny 'love'. Sometimes when things aren't 'perfect' to someones standards, take a step back and see why a person bothered in the first place?

[Dave Anderson NH]

About 20 years ago Sue was complaining bitterly about the ratty cardboard box filled with firewood next to the fireplace in the living room. I decided to build a key dovetailed pine box with lid. The keys and the molding were mahogany. I left the box the natural white pine color and finished it with a polyurethane for durability. Just as I completed it and asked her to help me carry it up to the living room she commented, " Can't you stain it or something to make it reddish brown?" The nex 5 minutes were spent explaining to her that there was no easy way to strip the finish and that over the years it would color up nicely.

No project has been made since without the input and design approval of management.

[Mike Wilkins]

I can relate to every comment stated here. Nothing pokes a pin into the ego ballon faster than a comment about something you have labored over for months. Only to have your wife ask if you can stain that beautiful cherry end table (2) a dark color to match something else. Or a comment about another cherry cabinet that went like this: "can you paint that?". I'll learn someday.

[Mike Davis NC]

When I want to build something for her I get some furniture catalogs or go online to get lots of pictures. "See anything here you like?" then see what changes we want to make and let it sit for a month. If she asks how it's coming along then i know it's time to start. She has made up her mind she wants it.

[Lee Koepke]

Thanks ya'll!

Well, an hour or two in the shop yesterday afternoon gave me time to present an alternative .... we pulled out the stand and put it back at the same angle the metal one was ... and that seems to satisfy us. It was and always will be a 'wasted' corner, so it makes anything you do difficult to balance out.

I had originally based this on something SHE pointed out in a magazine ... but there's no way I am pulling out that issue !!!! It works for now, and I am leaving it alone!!!!

and did I mention, I got 36 cuft of my shop back !!!! No more tripping over a half built piece of furniture. Have a great week, my fellow woodworkers!!!!