Bathroom Vanity

I have been extremely busy with work and school for the past couple of years, so I haven't had a whole lot of time for Woodworking. However, last September, my wife started to redo our Bathroom without any real plan. When it came to the new vanity, both her and I had an idea of what we wanted but couldn't find anything that would work so I ended up making it.

I started this project back in November 2009 and just finished it. It took so long just because I haven't had the time to dedicate to it.

I made it from a combination of cherry and cherry ply and finished it using 3 coats of General Finishes Water Based Expresso Stain followed by 3 coats of General Finishes Arm-R-Seal Gloss. A coat of General Finishes Pre-stain conditioner was applied before anything else.

Here is the frame glue-up - All joinery was done using the Festool Domino:
http://inlinethumb06.webshots.com/44...600x600Q85.jpg


The front:
http://inlinethumb29.webshots.com/38...600x600Q85.jpg

From the side:
http://inlinethumb56.webshots.com/39...600x600Q85.jpg

The drawers:
http://inlinethumb60.webshots.com/47...600x600Q85.jpg

Installed:
http://inlinethumb26.webshots.com/46...600x600Q85.jpg

The hardest part of this project had to be the inset doors. When I glued everything up, I checked and double-checked to make sure the frame was square. It was dead on... or so I thought. I must have bumped it before the glue set, because it was out of square 1.23 degrees, which was just enough to make the doors not fit. I ended up making new doors, but it was a real PITA and a letdown when I thought I was all done, but then had to go back and re-do the doors.

Thanks for looking.

Tim,
Very impressive work - looks great. One question though. What prompted your choice of stain? Maybe it's just the photo, but the end product looks more like walnut than cherry. The wood appears to have some really lovely figure that could have been brought out with just oil and shellac or some other neutral finish. Just my taste.

Great work and thanks for showing!

Hans Braul

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Hans Braul

Tim,
Very impressive work - looks great. One question though. What prompted your choice of stain? Maybe it's just the photo, but the end product looks more like walnut than cherry. The wood appears to have some really lovely figure that could have been brought out with just oil and shellac or some other neutral finish. Just my taste.

Great work and thanks for showing!

Hans Braul

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My wife wanted a darker wood. I tried to convince her otherwise, but she didn't want a 'lighter' color cabinet in the bathroom. I didn't go with walnut because I've built a number of things around the house with walnut and for this project, I wanted to use something with a closed grain.

My mom designs kitchens and baths and when we looked at all her samples, the one we liked the best as far as color was the cherry with the expresso finish.

I was going to make the whole thing out of poplar or maple and stain it, but I decided to go with Cherry since I had a whole bunch of it laying around. Since all the panels, bottom shelf and interior shelf were all cherry ply, I was able to construct the frame using mainly cutoffs - all pieces that were not wide enough to do anything with unless I glued a bunch of them up anyway. The legs in fact started as 4 - 4/4 pieces laminated. Since it was going to be stained, I didn't really care that they were not made from one solid piece of wood.

This is my first time staining anything other than poplar or maple. Normally I would just finish the piece with the Arm-R-Seal or if spray finishing Target USL.

One thing that I forgot to mention is that you cannot tell in the photo, but the cherry color does show through slightly. It is actually kind of cool because the piece actually has that 'distressed' look in places, which works so well in our house since it was built in 1917.

Tim my hats off to you and the wife , it looks great on this end and something to be very proud of . I think that you need to make more time in the wood shop - this is one thing that the talent shows for sure ......Marshall:)

Just when you think you're done...bam...something decides it doesn't want to play nice with the other pieces. Been there, done that, made it again :)

Great looking piece of furniture. My wife is looking for a double as well. She's found me a couple of pics, but like you, I haven't started it yet. She threatens to go out and buy one though if I don't get started.

So did you turn the legs?

Excellent design and exectuion, works very well in its "place".

Wow that is a very nice vanity and bathroom remodel you got there.

I too wouldn't be able to make inset doors and have them fit perfectly into the cabinet.

My strategy for a vanity with inset doors is make the cabinet with doors slightly oversize. Then trim the doors to size so they're a perfect fit. :D