Thomas Bennett
06-29-2012, 9:17 AM
Part of a cabinet and millwork job I just completed includes a kitchen table. The building is a second home, way out in the middle of nowhere/Southern Ohio. It is completely “off the grid.” The kitchen is very small, with limited countertop workspace. The owners wanted a breakfast-worktable. Usually there are three of them eating (one is a five year old) but they wanted the option of moving the table out in the center of the room to accommodate more people. They want to appreciate the view out the window as they eat breakfast. As a matter of fact, all of the windows in the house are placed to accentuate the views. The kitchen window is place about 46 inches off the floor. There were several design dilemmas. The owners wanted the table height to be 46” high! I bargained the height down to 40”, which is still very high. The height stretches out the proportions. As I am always looking for a way to utilize the lathe, I suggested turned legs. The customers gave me complete control of the aesthetics of the design. I did not want the legs to start with a block at the apron height. I also did not want too much detail. A lot of beads and coves can make a turning look very Victorian or colonial. I wanted to keep it real simple, to blend with the curly maple kitchen and cherry trim-work throughout the house. My solution was to start from the top with an elongated “bun”, a gentle, sweeping arc ending in an elongated sphere. I inserted levelers in the bottom. The top is made from one long natural edge slab. The slab was about 8-9 inches at the top tapering to about 12 inches at the bottom, about 14 feet long. I cut it in thirds, straight-lined along the taper, leaving the sap. I inverted the boards, long taper to short, sap to sap to lay it out to an approximate rectangle. I ripped one piece down the middle to use as the edges. Just by chance, all of this switching around made the top almost a rectangle. I had to fudge a little to get it to size. I usually use some sort of sharp, crisp, edge detail on a tabletop but left it gently softened due to the presence of the five year wild man. At 40 inches he would be at risk of hitting the corners and getting hurt. The dimensions are: 52 x 32 x 40 high. The finish is three coats of Minwax semi-gloss poly. As usual, the photos do not due the grain justice. Two separate evenings I dragged it out in the yard after the shadows diminished. The photos look dull, the top still reflects too much.