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Our house had a "bedroom" on the first floor. It was technically a "bedroom"
because of the closet. Anyway, leave it to my wife to reinvent this room into
something much better. She is going for an old Hollywood look in there. She
wanted to expand the closet to fit in a day bed, and have storage above and
below. I also added a ceiling fan, recessed lights, and light sconces. Adding
new switches was actually the hardest part. Additionally, we removed carpet
and I put down bamboo flooring. She added new curtains that would belong
in some old movie--very classy.
I got to buy a reciprocating saw for this project.
We started Jan 1st,
12:05am by knocking down the walls around the old closet. The closet header
was removed and the wall moved 2' to the left. This also involved moving
several CPVC plumbing lines that were in that wall--first time for me. The closet
on the other side of the wall was shrunken down and parts walled off. I made
this entryway suite to make up for the lost space:
http://www.bt3central.com/showthread.php?t=28823
After all the electrical, flooring, and drywall was done, I started on the upper
cabinets. Using cherry veneer from eBay, I veneered one side of some HD
poplar plywood and made the upper cabinets. The 4 inside vertical panels are
all bookmatched cherry veneer. The back is melamine. The shelves are
melamine with a sold cherry front. The face frames are solid cherry. They
are hung on a double set of French cleats. It's two separate boxes, but I
was still able to lift them into position--no easy task.
The underside of the cabinets was unfinished ply, so using the same veneer
as the upper cabinets, I veneered 2 sheets of ply and screwed them to the
bottom of the uppers. To disguise the gaps between the 2 panels and the
panels to the wall, I resawed cherry to 1/4" and applied them to the panels
to make it appear like a frame and panel. The stripe running the length of
the veneer is sapwood. Those panels are bookmatched.
Because this room isn't that large, my wife wanted to incorporate a lot of
storage by having file drawers under the bed. The space between the walls
allowed for 3 drawers that hold legal sized file folders and the last drawer is
for office supplies. In the space behind the drawers, we put a locking
document safe that can only be accessed by moving the mattress and
unlocking a panel. I built the drawer boxes out of poplar, carefully measured
the distance between tabs of a file folder, and ran a saw kerf groove that
distance apart running the length of the drawer. I then cut a piece of 1/8"
flat steel stock to the length of my drawer and pushed it into the kerf. The
files hang from a pair of those bars. These are just 4 plywood boxes that
are pocket screwed and glued together.
A standard twin mattress fits in the new space.
I knew my standard frame and panel doors wouldn't do for the look my wife
was going for. This is partly the reason why this project took so long--finding
a style that would fit this era. I figured it was somewhere around art deco
and this is what I settled on. The door frames started as rough 5/4 cherry
that I planed down to 7/8". I had to make a router table to use the picture
frame router bit for the door profile (MLCS). The routed pieces were cut to
size with my CMS, and biscuit slots cut on the 45s. The panels are all
straight grained cherry veneer that seemed to take forever to piece
together. I made a little template to help me keep a consistent angle. I
edge banded a piece of 1/2" MDF with solid cherry then hand planed it flush
to the surface of the MDF. I vacuum veneered the fronts and back. Then
I cut a rabbet on all 4 sides of the panels. Although it's obvious the panels
are veneer, it's not obvious what the substrate is because you only see the
solid cherry edge banding, not the MDF, when you peak into the rabbet--I'm
paranoid like that. The door glue up was a little scary but I got through it.
A lot of sanding and some chisel work was needed to flush up joints between
miters. The veneer on the bottom mirrors the veneer on the top.
The backs of the upper doors have the veneer going vertically. The backs
of the file drawers are some cheap veneer like birch or alder because you'll
never see them.
I'd like to say I was done with this project but I'm not. As you can see, there
is still base molding and crown molding to install. Oh yeah, I'm going to make
those, too, because I couldn't find real cherry moldings at the big box stores.
I also need to make my wife a desk, too, but I really just want to finish with
the moldings because I consider that a lot harder. I also need to make a
frame for a wall map that will fit between the upper cabinet and the bed.
Using HVLP, I sprayed shellac, dry 24 hours, light sanding with 320, then sprayed several coats of Hydrocote Resysthane Plus gloss lacquer. Light
sanding after the first coat but usually none between subsequent coats.
Myland's antique pine wax applied with a rag then rubbed out with 0000 steel
wool and buffed again with a clean rag.
Paul
Some parting shots.
because of the closet. Anyway, leave it to my wife to reinvent this room into
something much better. She is going for an old Hollywood look in there. She
wanted to expand the closet to fit in a day bed, and have storage above and
below. I also added a ceiling fan, recessed lights, and light sconces. Adding
new switches was actually the hardest part. Additionally, we removed carpet
and I put down bamboo flooring. She added new curtains that would belong
in some old movie--very classy.
I got to buy a reciprocating saw for this project.
We started Jan 1st,12:05am by knocking down the walls around the old closet. The closet header
was removed and the wall moved 2' to the left. This also involved moving
several CPVC plumbing lines that were in that wall--first time for me. The closet
on the other side of the wall was shrunken down and parts walled off. I made
this entryway suite to make up for the lost space:
http://www.bt3central.com/showthread.php?t=28823
After all the electrical, flooring, and drywall was done, I started on the upper
cabinets. Using cherry veneer from eBay, I veneered one side of some HD
poplar plywood and made the upper cabinets. The 4 inside vertical panels are
all bookmatched cherry veneer. The back is melamine. The shelves are
melamine with a sold cherry front. The face frames are solid cherry. They
are hung on a double set of French cleats. It's two separate boxes, but I
was still able to lift them into position--no easy task.
The underside of the cabinets was unfinished ply, so using the same veneer
as the upper cabinets, I veneered 2 sheets of ply and screwed them to the
bottom of the uppers. To disguise the gaps between the 2 panels and the
panels to the wall, I resawed cherry to 1/4" and applied them to the panels
to make it appear like a frame and panel. The stripe running the length of
the veneer is sapwood. Those panels are bookmatched.
Because this room isn't that large, my wife wanted to incorporate a lot of
storage by having file drawers under the bed. The space between the walls
allowed for 3 drawers that hold legal sized file folders and the last drawer is
for office supplies. In the space behind the drawers, we put a locking
document safe that can only be accessed by moving the mattress and
unlocking a panel. I built the drawer boxes out of poplar, carefully measured
the distance between tabs of a file folder, and ran a saw kerf groove that
distance apart running the length of the drawer. I then cut a piece of 1/8"
flat steel stock to the length of my drawer and pushed it into the kerf. The
files hang from a pair of those bars. These are just 4 plywood boxes that
are pocket screwed and glued together.
A standard twin mattress fits in the new space.
I knew my standard frame and panel doors wouldn't do for the look my wife
was going for. This is partly the reason why this project took so long--finding
a style that would fit this era. I figured it was somewhere around art deco
and this is what I settled on. The door frames started as rough 5/4 cherry
that I planed down to 7/8". I had to make a router table to use the picture
frame router bit for the door profile (MLCS). The routed pieces were cut to
size with my CMS, and biscuit slots cut on the 45s. The panels are all
straight grained cherry veneer that seemed to take forever to piece
together. I made a little template to help me keep a consistent angle. I
edge banded a piece of 1/2" MDF with solid cherry then hand planed it flush
to the surface of the MDF. I vacuum veneered the fronts and back. Then
I cut a rabbet on all 4 sides of the panels. Although it's obvious the panels
are veneer, it's not obvious what the substrate is because you only see the
solid cherry edge banding, not the MDF, when you peak into the rabbet--I'm
paranoid like that. The door glue up was a little scary but I got through it.
A lot of sanding and some chisel work was needed to flush up joints between
miters. The veneer on the bottom mirrors the veneer on the top.
The backs of the upper doors have the veneer going vertically. The backs
of the file drawers are some cheap veneer like birch or alder because you'll
never see them.
I'd like to say I was done with this project but I'm not. As you can see, there
is still base molding and crown molding to install. Oh yeah, I'm going to make
those, too, because I couldn't find real cherry moldings at the big box stores.
I also need to make my wife a desk, too, but I really just want to finish with
the moldings because I consider that a lot harder. I also need to make a
frame for a wall map that will fit between the upper cabinet and the bed.
Using HVLP, I sprayed shellac, dry 24 hours, light sanding with 320, then sprayed several coats of Hydrocote Resysthane Plus gloss lacquer. Light
sanding after the first coat but usually none between subsequent coats.
Myland's antique pine wax applied with a rag then rubbed out with 0000 steel
wool and buffed again with a clean rag.
Paul
Some parting shots.
Loring in Katy, TX USA
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