Greene and Greene Sideboard

Hi all.

I said one of the things I was going to do with this blog is tell you the stories behind some of the furniture I have done.  The first one I am going to write about is this sideboard.

It started with some leftover white oak from another project.  I had a brain fart and ordered way too much lumber.  (math was never my forte)  Anyway, white oak is very traditional in Arts and Crafts furniture and I wanted to do a sideboard.  I have made a few sideboards and they usually do well at shows.  I knew I wanted to do this top.  It is a classic Greene and Greene design.  I just didn’t have a design for the rest of the piece.  I don’t ordinarily do a faithful reproduction of a piece but prefer to do my own interpretation.  I drew this sideboard up on the computer and then drew it full sized on paper.  Seeing it full sized, I quickly realized it was too big.  I adjusted the size and started cutting.  As Iwas cutting and roughing out the carcase, I spent a lot of time standing back and looking at it and bugging my wife, Michele, to come down to the shop and look.  She has a good eye for design and always has good ideas.  We bounced around a bunch of ideas and the piece started taking shape.  I got thinking about the details I wanted and came up with this inlay.

It’s real ebony wood.  The square pegs are ebonized walnut.  This is a cool process.  To ebonize wood, you soak rusty steel in some vinegar for a couple of weeks.  Strain it through some cheese cloth and paint the vinegar on the wood and it turns black.  Try it, it’s cool!! 

Anyway, I was real happy with the inlay and got the rest of the piece put together.  Then it came to the handles.  I couldn’t find anything I liked.  I went through every catalog I had.  Michele went through them twice.  She picked out some maybes but nothing that rocked me.  That’s when I decided to make something.  I thought about it, studied it, thought some more and studied it some more.  Finally I came up with these handles.

They are real simple, but work well.  They are square with faceted ends set into two square pyramids and wrapped with copper wire and ebonized with the vinegar process.  I really liked them and showed them to Michele.  She really didn’t like them and tried real hard to talk me out of using them.  This is one time I didn’t listen to her.   I get more good comments about them than anything else on it.  She still doesn’t like them.

So, that’s how this piece came to be.  Unfortunately, it’s still looking for a home, but eventually, the right person will see it.  I did make a second one for a woman in California though.  She saw this one on my website and wanted one in cherry.  We put some outrageous bird’s-eye maple in the door panels and drawer fronts.  She loved it!!.  Here’s a picture.

Some of the details are a bit different but you definitely get the resemblance.

That’s it for now.  Hope you’re still with me.

Thanks.