Personal Projects

With the Thanksgiving crunch-time over with, I'm finally taking some time to work on some projects that I've wanted to do around the house. (Still have to find time to make a new Table for ourselves, I might mention.)

One of them is this old Vintage, Marquee Arrow Sign. I had been thinking about doing a huge letter, that looked like it was part of an old Company Store Sign. Like something a person might find at a flea market. I had decided to make a huge letter "C" but my wife didn't like the idea. She said, "What does the C stand for?" --- That's just it. It doesn't stand for anything. I felt like if it was to appear authentically like a flea-market find,  it wouldn't be something cliche like one of our family's initials. That would be too obvious and too much to ask of coincidence.

With letters being too cliche, they were out of the picture. I wanted to completely allay any questions when people come in such as, "Ah, what does the letter stand for?"  --- Or, "Why the huge letter on the wall?"

So, I just kept the sign sterile as a huge lit-up arrow. Self-explanatory. Simple. Obvious. Clean. No Question Marks. No Explanations. 

Don't ask me why it's pointing the direction that it is. It just is. Everything doesn't have to have some profound symbolism. Sometimes things just exist. And that's okay.

 COAT RACK: BLACK CHERRY AND BRUSHED STEEL

The next project I've had marinating for some time now and just haven't had time to do is this Coat/Hat Rack.

The Cherry is from some logs that were cleared to make room to build houses near Mechanicsburg, IL. We were laying brick on one of them and I noticed the huge pile of logs that looked too good to burn. So, after work several days I took my chainsaw and cut manageable lengths of Cherry out of the pile. The interesting part is that they were quite straight, which is unusual for Black Cherry trees. Typically Cherry trees grow very crooked and curved.

Several days I loaded up what I could fit in my truck and took them to Hank Whitehurst, my local sawmill man near Tallula, IL. He was a great woodworker and had his own sawmill. He would build bartops for Local Restaurants, tables/chairs, anything anyone wanted made out of wood; he could do. He taught me most of what I know about woodworking. Without rambling on too much about everything under the sun except the aforementioned hatrack; I should mention that Hank died a few years ago. His sawmill burned down a year or two before that. So sad. 

Anyway, this cherry wood is one of the priceless pieces of that Cherry wood. I've had to wait a few years for it to completely dry enough to work with. I've brought it 1000 miles with me down to Texas. Moved it 3-4 times since then. And I suppose it just keeps getting more sentimental to me as time goes on.

As you might know, Cherry wood gets darker as it gets older. I don't know/remember all the specifics, but I think exposure to light has something to do with it. I can vouch for that as a desk I made out of the cherry was a lighter pinkish-yellow when I built it and today it is a dark, rich reddish burgundy-brown color.

Without further ado, here is the Coat Rack in the Front Entryway: