Lectern project ... completed with pics!

[Jim Becker]

Tom, that looks great. I like how you incorporated "open space" in the design. It makes what is a rather substantial piece feel lighter and more integrated with its surroundings. Great job!

[Bert Johansen]

Tom--
That's a beautiful design and the execution looks great from the photos. That's some scrap pile you must have! Thanks for sharing with us.
Bert

[Marty Walsh]

Tom,

Great execution for a great design! It looks very light and airy, but I suspect it's quite stout with that base.

How did you support the cross, dadoes in the uprights? Oh, and what finish did you decide on?

That truly is some trash pile you must have!

- Marty -

[Larry Klaaren]

Hey, I speak at a church every week , thought I'd throw out a couple of thoughts.

I think you are doing a great thing!

Whenever I speak from a lectern, I usually don't have enough space to put things. I don't use a lot of notes, but I have at least two books (Bible and Hymnbook) to put somewhere. More if I have the order for baptism or the Lord's Supper, or some other 'occasional service' with me also. Lecterns typically don't have a second shelf. I usually need a place to put a glass of water. In my experience, lecterns tend to be too small for every week use. That's more true if one person is responsible for all parts of the service (as opposed to people bringing just what they need for one segment of the service to the lectern). You might want to design with that in mind.

There are occasions when you want or need to put something "out of sight". Perhaps it's a visual aid, perhaps its something that you don't wan't people to be thinking about because you are past or not yet to that part of the service.

Portability is the best thing about lecterns as opposed to pulpits. I often just move them out of the way (no offense intended - sometimes I just walk around). Sometime you might want to move them for a musical group or something else that is a part of the service, during the service.

So, I'd be thinking bigger and portable, and if you can work it into your design, a second shelf - and that one needs to be level if it is a place to put a glass of water.

If you are working with a pastor on this, ask the pastor how he/she feels about these things. I know some churches have a lectern on one side and a pulpit on the other, and that pretty much makes most of what I was thinking about moot. If you have fixed seating in your sanctuary portability moves down in importance, as you won't be changing the seating configuration.

Just some thoughts. All of the designs looked great. I think that the style, color scheme, lighting, and furnishing of your worship space is so important to how that should go that I can't comment on it. Don't know if you are modern, traditional, colonial, or something else. If you have a predominance of wood, that limits your options.

I would consult with others in the congregation about that. I feel terrible when someone works hard doing something like you are doing, and it's "not a fit" for almost everyone else. We had that recently when a woman refurnished a meeting room with the insurance money when her husband died. (She didn't need it so she thought she'd use it that way.) The furniture she purchased did not go with the furniture that she kept - in one very vocal person's opinion. Collaboration is good, and they might help sand!

Best wishes on this,
Larry

[Tom Jones III]

Thanks everyone. It was a lot of fun to build. This was for a church that does not yet have a permanent home so light and portable was important. Generally I like to build things very sturdy, and this was not quite as strong as I'd like. However, you could stand on it, if you were so inclined. It is a little weak if you grab the top and twist but that shouldn't be much of an issue.

The cross is dado'd together and then dado'd into the uprights. There is no glue, it is just extremely tight. The shelf behind the cross is sliding DT with no glue to allow for wood movement. Since the uprights are angled away from each other the shelf is trapped. The cross and shelf actually added quite a bit of stiffness to the lectern.

LOML (a semi-pro artist) is the finisher on all my projects. Unfortunately she was out of town so this was the first project that I put a finish on. The maple cross has clear shellac. This was my first attempt ever to shellac anything. After receiving instructions from LOML, I gave it a try. Pretty soon I was going through the old testament looking for some really good curses ... Anyway I finally got it done. The walnut is two coats of BLO. I even managed to mess that up as I put it on a little too heavy then did not wipe it off enough. I put blue painters tape around the top veneer to keep the BLO off it and that worked fine.

Tom,

Great execution for a great design! It looks very light and airy, but I suspect it's quite stout with that base.

How did you support the cross, dadoes in the uprights? Oh, and what finish did you decide on?

That truly is some trash pile you must have!

- Marty -

[Jeffrey Makiel]

Wow. I would have never thought this would be such a popular project. But now when I think of it, it makes perfect sense! And the designs possibilities seem endless.

Keep those pics a comin'...Jeff

[Chris Giles]

Tom,
One thing I am curious about. In executing this design, what method(s) did you use to determine the height and size of the Cross? I would have agonized over this placement and probably never been satisfied with my final choice, but you seem to have really hit the mark. Did you just eyeball it, or was there some other more "devine" way to arrive at your final solution? I really like it.

[Keith Outten]

Outstanding Tom...simply elegant

[Tom Jones III]

Tom,
One thing I am curious about. In executing this design, what method(s) did you use to determine the height and size of the Cross? I would have agonized over this placement and probably never been satisfied with my final choice, but you seem to have really hit the mark. Did you just eyeball it, or was there some other more "devine" way to arrive at your final solution? I really like it.

I was also surprised with the interest in this project. I sure was grateful for the help. The placement and size of the cross wasn't too hard to determine. I got an art minor that included an entire semester class on design principles. I never realized how useful that class would be. One of the most basic principles is to divide your canvas either into halves or thirds. The horizontal piece of the cross is 1/3 of the way down the column. It is also 1/3 down from the top of the cross. Initially I was going to make the horizontal piece 2/3 of the length of the vertical piece, and that looked fine. However after looking around at existing crosses, I realized that shorter horizontal pieces were common, so it is closer to half the length of the vertical part.

[Roger Myers]

Outstanding Tom...simply elegant

What Keith said - Elegant!!
Really came out beautiful!!
Roger

[Randy Looney]

Thanks for all the help. As you can see, I took several of the suggestions. I'm pretty happy with the design although there are several aspects of the execution that I am very unhappy with. From the execution standpoint this was almost thrown away and redone. This was my first real veneer attempt and it went well enough for a first try.

I thought I would post the pictures since so many people contributed to the design and I thought that the design turned out very well.

One nice thing about the overall project, it was made entirely from wood I already had. The base, feet, cross, and top (except for the veneer) all came out of the trash pile!

WOW Tom, that turned out great and I like the design.