I was passing by a yard in Pennsylvania with a newly cut tree, and I told them what I did, and they were nice enough to let me have a few large chunks.
I had always fractal burned only flat pieces up to this point, but I figured why not burn 3 dimensional chunks of wood? My husband cut them into smaller chunks for me. The best part about these pieces were the saw marks and unevenness, which I didn’t attempt to “fix”.
Below are the results!
I have always wanted to create a table like this but often these dough tray have round bottoms which you can’t attach legs to, or the well is too deep, etc. I have always loved dough trays since they are carved out of one solid piece of wood!
This one has a nice flat underside for table legs and a nice flat top side for a table surface.
I start by adding several coats of clear lacquer to give it a clear, shiny protective finish without taking away from its original patina.
I wanted the table to be unique so I decided to add removable, sliding trays to the top. I bought a piece of cherry for a contrasting wood color and cut it into 3 pieces.
Continue reading
[Buy this fabulous vintage coffee table – available now in my shop!]
These single row 5 drawer card catalog configurations make amazing coffee tables!
Often these card catalogs were part of a bigger system and therefore don’t have a top or a finished top. I recently found another (they are hard to find!) – this particular one also is a “newer” one with some lovely, groovy 70s yellow varnish, wooden drawer fronts, amazing hardware and plastic drawers.
[Buy Live Edge Wood Wall Art now in my shop!]
I’ve always created live edge wood tables with fractal burning and epoxy resin, but then it occurred to me that smaller pieces would also look fabulous as wall, mantle or shelf art!
In the summer of 2020, my husband and I built a Lichtenberg Wood Burning Tool, also called fractal burning. Fractal burning occurs when a conductive solution is applied to the wood and then electricity is introduced via 2 electrodes wired from a transformer (microwave). As the current tries to connect, the high voltage burns river like patterns into the wood.
I always look for uniquely shaped wood for my one-of-a-kind live Edge Wood Wall Art. Depending on the wood type, wood grain and color, sometimes I add epoxy resin, sometimes I leave just the fractal burning patterns.
Sometimes you find a sewing machine that cannot be saved, but still has some good parts to it! That’s what happened with this set of sewing machine drawers. I had seen in these in the past be re-purposed into a table.
The woodwork on these drawers is incredible. I imagined putting some sort of table top on it (the one pictured is from the sewing machine but not salvageable) and table legs on the underside. I found the perfect set of hairpin legs with L brackets that fit perfectly.
I first had to clean the drawers. I used a wet sponge for the first pass, then I used tung oil to bring out the wood color and grain. to get into the woodwork, I also dipped a toothbrush and q-tips in the oil to get to the hard to reach places.
Continue reading[browse my current vintage furniture available now in my shop!]
I have always wanted to try and build a live edge wood table. I wanted the kind with little cracks and wells in them so I could fill it with colored resin. Through a lot of trial and error, I did it! And I learned a lot in the process for the next live edge resin table. (Yes, next!)
The one I chose was a teak “starfish” imported from Indonesia. It was 3″ thick and 36″ wide at its widest point and weighed 50lbs.
Here’s a video talking about what I planned to do for this project:
Continue reading
