Furniture Design Ideas

Scallop shells, stylized sunbursts and fans were popular carvings applied to Queen Anne, Georgian, and Chippendale furniture throughout the 18th Century. Carved by hand, decorative motifs like the one at right were commonly found on the aprons of highboys. They were also used to adorn the knees of cabriole legs and the fronts of central […]

MAKING AND INSTALLING THE QUARTER COLUMNS 1 Making the columns Cut a blank several inches longer than the finished length of the columns, and wide and thick enough for the number of quarter columns you need. Rip the blank into quarters, joint the inside surfaces of the pieces, then glue and clamp them back together […]

Cutting the flutes Make a blank for each finial that is slightly larger than the finished dimensions. Mark the top and bottom of the pommel on the blank and use Xs to indicate the waste section below the pommel. Use the dado head in a table saw to reduce the blank’s thickness between the two […]

The crown molding—or pediment—on each side of the highboy front is actually built up from four separate pieces of wood. The broken swan-neck face molding that curves upwards from the front cor­ner to the rosette is made from two pieces of molding glued together. With the help of a template cut on the band saw, […]

1 Cutting the dovetail joints Size the drawer parts to fit the openings in the chests, then rout the dovetails, cutting the pins in the front and back pieces and the tails in the sides. A set of commercial templates like the one shown on this page makes the job simple and ensures accurate results. […]

1 Preparing the drawer openings Use a router fitted with a й-inch pilot­ed rabbeting bit to cut the rabbets around the drawer openings. Set the depth of cut at ‘A inch, then attach a square piece of /- inch clear acrylic to the tool’s base plate (inset). Make this auxiliary sub-base large enough to keep […]

1 Designing the leg Make a template from a piece of й-inch plywood or hardboard cut to the same length and width as your leg blanks. The design shown above at top will yield an attractive, stable, and well-proportioned leg, but you can alter the pattern to suit your project or copy the design of […]

The highboy’s upper chest has two major components: a large carcase and an elaborate face frame that fits within it. As shown below, the carcase consists of a top and bottom, two side panels, and two back panels separated by a stile—or muntin. The carcase cor­ners are joined with through dovetail joints (page 26), and […]

Shell carving (page 137) Bottom rail (page 116) Knee block (page 117) Cabriole leg (page 112)

The highboy originated in 17th Century Europe and was in­spired by the ornate Chinese lac­quered cabinets imported for the English nobility. Because of its size, the highboy—or high chest of drawers—was constructed in two sections: a lower chest that sup­ported a taller chest with four or more tiers. The top level was fre­quently divided into […]