It definitely adds some interesting character to a piece! The project I'm working on right now is going to have a similar combo of natural and painted wood, so it should be pretty interesting!
Beautiful cabinet! Although I’m a fan of unstained, unpainted wood, what you’ve made is really beautiful. I love the mix of colors and textures, and that the wood grain is visible through the paint. Very well done.
I'm not usually a fan of painted furniture either, I think that's mostly because what we see is DIY Ikea stuff. Definitely when you take the time to incorporate it into the design nicely, paint is a pretty powerful thing!
Tanks, I've always been a fan of dark green and it's very convenient that it blends so well with wood! Lucky my favourite color wasn't pink because that would be much hard to find a good pairing!
this is an absolutely gorgeous piece. I really like your style of furniture they're always really done but this one is probably my favorite the painting was definitely a good idea even if painting isn't something you'd traditionally do it fits this one extremely well.
Thank you so much, this is definitely one of my favourite pieces too! An interesting thing I've found after bringing this piece inside is that it surprisingly goes really well with my other furniture. I was kind of worried that the paint might make it clash but by tieing in that natural white oak everything seems to blend together!
Love to see a fellow Canuck on a channel. Your skills and technique are better than you give yourself credit for. I’m mostly jealous of your shop and tools. I’ve been mentoring a young friend in woodworking and hope to teach him the old school methods I was taught like mortise and tenon NOT pocket holes. Cheers.
It definitely took me a bit to get this nice of a shop setup! Old school is the best way to get into woodworking, I started using mostly machines and pocket holes and now I'm finally starting to understand the benefits of traditional tools!
Thanks, I recently saw a Greene and Greene style cabinet at an antique store and the details have been stuck in my head! I'm looking forward to trying out some more Greene and Greene details going forward!
This is one of my favourite pieces, Morgan! I love the paint on it and definitely want to see more. I’m inspired to learn how to integrate paint into my work also. I also have to say your design chops are amazing! You shouldn’t apologize to us for cramming in learning opportunities. We’re here to enjoy your risk taking and the amazing results you’re getting! Well done!
Thanks Robert, this project has definitely earned its place in my top projects too! Paint is a very powerful design element, more than I even realized but it adds such a cool touch with the solid coloring and wood grain!
Just a suggestion on the shelves, instead of having the breadboard ends facing the cabinet sides try facing them front to back, much cleaner look. Beautiful piece and I love the contrast of the green paint!
Yeah, I thought of that when I put the shelves in the finished piece, especially since these ones are almost square it would've looked a little cleaner! Thanks for pointing that out though, it'll help me remember it on the next project!
When I first heard the word "Paint", I screamed NO!!! But as I watched I begin to like what your doing. The piece came out really nice and the "Paint" actually made the piece "Pop". Very nice work.
Fantastic piece Morgan! You have a great sense of scale and proportion with your work, I can definitely see the Green and Green influence on this one. Thanks for the inspiration!
I've been looking at Greene & Greene furniture for a while now and haven't been able to wrap my head around it! Figured I would try out some smaller elements before taking them on to a larger project! Thanks for watching!
I’ve been woodworking for …..over 45 years and ,a you can imagine, I’ve seen huge changes in materials and techniques available to the smaller shop. The router and adhesive quality are probably the two biggest but even abrasives - when I started, we used dried fish skin (from a dog fish which is in the shark family). Throughout, the key phrase for me is that taste is personal whilst skill is universal. When we built pieces for a client, there things that I didn’t like - were not to my taste - but the client wanted them. Notwithstanding the aesthetic, I hope the skill was still there. Having said all that, it’s not a shy criticism of this piece. I like the aesthetic very much - it’s in the Arts and Crafts genre that I now building all my pieces within (UK A&C plus bits of Greene and Greene, Stickley etc.). Okay, I wouldn’t, personally, have the finger joints showing on the drawers - I don’t like them on G&G stuff - but I’m very fond of the visible pegs with the button tops. Again, G&G used them a lot but, apparently, often to hide the screw that secured the joint. I wouldn’t have believed that but it came from Darrell Peart and he is the expert. I’m finishing the interior fit out of a converted barn and I think we are now past $30,000 of European oak for doors, stairs, trims etc. The colour we wanted was the fumed oak that was very popular around the end 19th/ early 20th century. I don’t know if you have actually fumed oak (with ammonia) but it’s a nasty process. So, I decided to stain the oak to that fumed oak colour. Another popular stain was to apply ferrous acid (vinegar and steel solution). That ebonite’s timber with tannins and, of course, no shortage of tannin in oak. You can control the effect to go from grey to jet back. Contrast that to natural oak in a piece and I find the effect very pleasing. I have painted wood on pieces (as opposed to the normal way of painting trim if you want a coloured finish) and I think the byword for me is “less is enough”. So, none of my pieces are fully painted but have highlights or insets of painted pieces. In your piece, I think the choice of paint is excellent. It does, as others have said, go well with the colour of the natural timber. Unless I had something like ash lying around, I must admit that I would use poplar as it works and finishes superbly - and is much cheaper. On the question of design. I guess I’m past the point where I think about technique and then design around using that technique. I’m at the stage where I think of a design and then work out how I’m going to make it. That process, for me, satisfies the key criteria of form and function. But, that’s just me. Very much enjoyed this video from me. I’m off to check your playlist.
Gorgeous work as always. The paint looks great, I think letting the grain show through it is a crucial detail. This style of construction is beautiful im going to have to try it myself!
I want to so badly, I've been doing a ton of research into it and it's coming soon. I'm also planning to take a stained glass course this year which should help making some exciting pieces!
I have to agree with you that wood, whenever possible, should be natural. But I really like all of the contrast that the painted wood, stained alder and the natural oak highlights bring together. Beautiful work!
Thanks! Paint is definitely one of those things that can be easily overdone, my plan for this style of painted furniture is to use it for one or two pieces in a room to add some pops of color here and there and break up the natural wood pieces.
For water based stains I mix dye stain and spray with hvlp gun saturating the piece then wipe off. I get very even results. Can be messy though. If you don’t have booth with good ventilation I suggest a good open space. This is a beautiful piece.
I've read some stuff about spraying stains but never really gave it much thought. Once the weather warms up, I'll have try taking a piece outside and spraying some stain!
Only because you asked! I think you did an amazing job, I love the paint and color. The only thing throwing me off are the two different shades of wood. Had they all been unstained or stained them all, I think it would have looked less busy. I’m a jerk. You asked. You’re still amazing!
This is the kind of constructive criticism I love to get! I get what your saying, I decided on this project to break my standard rule of only having two colors because I thought the painted frame kind of "didn't count" as another color but it definitely holds alot more visual weight than I'd expected. It's been really interesting hearing what people think because some people like the busy look while others don't, and I'm stuck somewhere in between!
The paint with the wood looks great and so does the whole piece, however there are to manny colors/ textures for me personally. (Not a dig, just my taste) and I’d turn the shelves 90* if you do breadboard ends. There will still be plenty of strength especially on narrow widths and give a cleaner appearance.
I completely agree with you, way to many different colors, this was a bit of an experiment and good/hard lesson. I'm definitely going to keep it to one or two colors on future projects.
Ooohhhhh. Lots to unpack here. 1, the overal piece has a elevated green and green look. Think eclectic smoking room which is awesome. 2. The painted wood acentuates the stained wood, again elevating the look. 3. Box joints were a great choice. 4. The voice over is so much better than hearing the tablesaw and I like knowing what caused changes in the design. Its how I work. Happy accidents
I think there is a time and place for paint on wood. Using paint as an accent and intentional integration into the design for contrast and accent of the wood grain works. Too often paint is used to just cover up an older finish. I think you did really well with the ash and highlighting the texture of the wood and grain.
Exactly, I've wanted to use paint on a piece of furniture for a few months now but I had to do alot of experiments to figure out how to use it in a why that wouldn't look horrible. It took a while, but I do think this combination of paint, wood and finish is going to be my go to for adding some pops of color!
Occasional wood worker here, super nervous about color in general, never know what people will want/like. The more you deviate from natural tones the greater the risk. If I build it for my home I let the boss decide what she likes. Paint is a risk but such is life and this looks good
I fully agree with you, this is why I still try to avoid colors, because in some way it feels kind of wrong. I think the most important thing if you want to add color to a piece is that it needs to look very intentional!
It does make it a little more interesting to mix it up every once in a while and I'm finding that having some natural wood and some colored/painted pieces helps bring a little more interest to a room!
I'm planning to get back into doing tutorials soon so I'll make sure that video is on the top of the list! The jisk of it is that you want the spacer piece to be thick enough to fully hold your hinge and not break, I made these ones almost to thin but they still worked. By standard I go with 1/8", which works perfectly for the horton brasses hinges that are about 1/16" thick hinges leaves. For door reveal I still mess that up constantly, but I'm getting slightly better each time! The defining factor for your door reveal is the hinge in it's closed position, so if you're working with hinges you haven't used before start by mortising them into a couple scrap pieces, then measure the gap in the "closed" position. Then just account for that gap around the whole door. Then to figure out the door size just plug in the number, these are the one's I use for the horton brasses hinges. Door Opening - 1/8" (Spacer) - 1/4" (1/8" reveal either side) = Door Width
I think Ash or Red Oak with the deep grain looks good painted a lot of the time. Or even maple if you want a flat smooth look. If you start to paint mahogany, that's heresy.
I did like Red Oak in my testing, I found that the grains were a little more subtle when painted than ash, kind of a nice inbetween of ash and maple. Red Oak definitely stains better than ash though and I'm going to be putting that to use in an upcoming project. Well there goes my next project, I was really looking forward to making a mahogany cabinet then giving it a nice white paint job!
Thanks for sharing. Could you please talk more about the home made jig you have for the mortiser around the 4 minute mark? It looks interesting/useful. Many thanks.
I figured I might get some questions about that, it's a new addition that I'm just trying out at the moment and working out the kinks. There'll be a mk. II version after I've worked this out on a few project! The basic idea is that I just wanted taller fences that would hold the pieces firmly in place because the wheels that come with the mortiser allow taller work pieces to pull away from the fence and angle the mortise. By locking the pieces between the two mdf fences the pieces can't angle at all! The other problem with the powermatic mortiser is that they put a hole in the base that pieces will rock into when cutting a mortise near the end of the board, so I add in a bottom piece of mdf to cover up that hole and on this project I was able to use it to cut through mortises cleanly. It was an absolute game changer on this project and when I put together the better version I'll make a video explaining how to make it.
I think the cabinet looks great! Too pretty to hang in the shop. I really like the paint on this piece. I do think the breadboard ends on the shelves should go front to back. Just my opinion though.
Too pretty to hang where I was planning to as well, the spot I had planned was in a corner and just didn't do this piece justice! I agree with you about the bread board ends, in hindsight it would've looked alot cleaner having the shelves turned 90 degrees. Normally I like having that little detail on the front edge of the shelves but I think on this cabinet it looks a little to busy.
So, it's just version one at the moment and I'm planning to use it over a few projects before finalizing the design then I'll definitely be putting out a video on how to make them because even on this project it was an absolute game changer! The biggest issue I've had with the mortiser is that those small wheels don't hold taller pieces tight enough against the fence and I keep ending up with angled mortises that then make the frames twisted. The taller fence on the back and the reinforced fence on the front hold the workpiece in place perfectly and I just rub paraffin wax on both fences and the pieces glide right through. The other issue is that stupid hold in the base, when ever I try to cut mortises near the end of a board the pieces rock into the hole a screw up the mortise so I added a piece of MDF under the front fence and that solved that problem. It also let me cut through mortises much cleaner because the fibres are supported on the back side of the cut.
thank you Morgan . i can put up with a light coat of paint if it shows the grain this project looked good . question please do you like your pin nailer ? would you buy it again ?
That's my thinking to and why it took me so long to figure out how to paint wood in a way that doesn't look like a botched DIY job. I would definitely recommend this pin nailer, I splurged a bit when I bought and it's been a really good reliable tool!
Thanks, and I understand what you're saying. This is definitely busier than the pieces I normally make, I wanted to kind of stretch the boundaries on this one and see how far I could go. What would you remove or change to make it less busy?
Man can you talk! You should have been a woman! hehehe. I love that you explain all the steps. Some don't talk at all and I have to rewind to see what they are doing again. This is a gorgeous piece of furniture!
It’s occurred to me to wonder: how has paint changed since… oh I don’t know, say the late 1800s. Maybe today’s paint is so much thicker than a century or so ago that painting fine woodworking just looks terrible. 🤔
I actually did a decent amount a research into this while trying to figure out this technique and from what I found the two most common traditional paints were milk (water based) paint and linseed oil paint. What I found most interesting is that the pigments used in transitional paints aren't all the different from what we use to today, the main differences is the hardeners. Milk paint used lime and clay while modern paint uses latex, so it's actually kind of the opposite from what you said. Traditional paint sits thicker on the surface of wood and that's why when you see alot of older painted furniture the paint is chipping off, where modern paints are less likely to do that since they are thinner but the layers have much stronger bonds. I did alot of testing because I thought that answer to painting furniture nicely was going to be milk paint but after a ton of trial and error it turned out that some simple latex paint from home depot that was sprayed on gave the best results. My conclusion was that because the modern paint has stronger bonds, that allowed me to thin it down enough to allow it to soak into the pores of the wood. The other massive part of this combination is the wood, no other wood except for ash looks good when painted. Even red oak which was a close second was just not porous enough to have a nice amount of the grain showing through. Ash just has such massive pores that paint can easily work its way in. It's even better if you use the really young ash sapwood because that has even larger pores and the grain shows right through the paint!
@@morganhurst_redridge you’ve given me a lot to think about. I’m planning to building a wood frame for some art we have and my wife said she wants a black frame. I was thinking of using cherry then painting it with black milk paint. I was also thinking about ebonizing the wood (there’s a video that shows a technique using tea and iron dissolved into vinegar that looks really effective). I don’t have an airbrush so I’m left to experiment with other techniques. My impression about the thickness of paint was based on paint I bought over the years. It seems way thicker now than it used to be. I’m not a century old but assumed older paint was thinner and didn’t cover as well. 😛
I use to make alot of picture frames and the best combo I found for a pure black finish is ash or oak and india ink. That give you a pure black while still showing some nice grain patterns. Ebonizing is also really cool technique and definitely worth experimenting with, I found through some testing that is tends to give you black/grey coloring with strong purple/blue undertones which is a very unique look. It can be unpredictable which is why I haven't used it yet on a piece of furniture but someday I want to try it again!
Your first comment of "too much talk." was very straightforward and to the point but then you felt the need to leave this second comment with even more words. One might say you comment too much?
Did you know you can control the volume yourself? Just press the buttons on the side of your phone and it won't be loud enough to make your ears bleed.
I get not everyone likes the commentary, I have another channel that's just the shop sounds if that's something that interests you - www.youtube.com/@redridge-shopsounds
@@morganhurst_redridge no no no, don’t misunderstand me, I enjoy commentary. It helps to understand the video. I just think your videos would do better if they were a bit shorter and a little less commentary. Not telling you to BE like anyone else, but the channels that do well have shorter videos and less commentary.
This piece came out beautifully. Sometimes painting wood works out. This is one of those times.
Paint is definitely an interesting touch, easy to over do but when used right makes for a very interesting look!
I really love the way this turned out. I've never seen a painted/natural combination. Wonderful job...
It definitely adds some interesting character to a piece! The project I'm working on right now is going to have a similar combo of natural and painted wood, so it should be pretty interesting!
Beautiful piece
Thank you very much!
Amazing work it turned out beautiful true craftsman
Glad you liked it!
That came out very nice.
Thank you!
Beautiful cabinet! Although I’m a fan of unstained, unpainted wood, what you’ve made is really beautiful. I love the mix of colors and textures, and that the wood grain is visible through the paint. Very well done.
Thanks, I'm typically a fan of natural wood too but this project was a bit of an experiment, just to see if I liked the idea!
Not usually a fan of painting but the contrasting colors and mix of natural wood is awesome. Great job.
I'm not usually a fan of painted furniture either, I think that's mostly because what we see is DIY Ikea stuff. Definitely when you take the time to incorporate it into the design nicely, paint is a pretty powerful thing!
Looks fantastic. Sir, you're definitely an artist.
Thank you kindly!
This is a gorgeous cabinet. The paint choice is perfect because it highlights the natural wood.
Tanks, I've always been a fan of dark green and it's very convenient that it blends so well with wood! Lucky my favourite color wasn't pink because that would be much hard to find a good pairing!
I like the painted wood and how it contrasts with the natural wood. Looks good.
It's definitely an interesting combo, I'm looking forward to experimenting more with it in upcoming projects!
You did a fine job there, it’s really beautiful.
Another beautiful project!
Thank you!
this is an absolutely gorgeous piece. I really like your style of furniture they're always really done but this one is probably my favorite the painting was definitely a good idea even if painting isn't something you'd traditionally do it fits this one extremely well.
Thank you so much, this is definitely one of my favourite pieces too!
An interesting thing I've found after bringing this piece inside is that it surprisingly goes really well with my other furniture. I was kind of worried that the paint might make it clash but by tieing in that natural white oak everything seems to blend together!
I think your craftsmanship is great. great job!!
Thank you, I really appreciate that!
Love the contrast. Looks great.
I've always love strong contrast, the paint just takes it to the next level!
Fantastic job.
Congratulations great result
Perfect combination, painted and stained wood.
Thank you so much!
Normally I'm not a fan of paint. However, the contrast on that piece is beautiful. Nice job
Paint is definitely an interesting thing to work with, it took so long to figure out the perfect combination that would actually look good!
Love to see a fellow Canuck on a channel. Your skills and technique are better than you give yourself credit for. I’m mostly jealous of your shop and tools. I’ve been mentoring a young friend in woodworking and hope to teach him the old school methods I was taught like mortise and tenon NOT pocket holes. Cheers.
It definitely took me a bit to get this nice of a shop setup!
Old school is the best way to get into woodworking, I started using mostly machines and pocket holes and now I'm finally starting to understand the benefits of traditional tools!
I really like how this turned out. The Greene and Greene plugs were a perfect addition.
Thanks, I recently saw a Greene and Greene style cabinet at an antique store and the details have been stuck in my head! I'm looking forward to trying out some more Greene and Greene details going forward!
This is one of my favourite pieces, Morgan! I love the paint on it and definitely want to see more. I’m inspired to learn how to integrate paint into my work also.
I also have to say your design chops are amazing! You shouldn’t apologize to us for cramming in learning opportunities. We’re here to enjoy your risk taking and the amazing results you’re getting!
Well done!
Thanks Robert, this project has definitely earned its place in my top projects too! Paint is a very powerful design element, more than I even realized but it adds such a cool touch with the solid coloring and wood grain!
nice work
Thanks!
great job! really love the contrasting color and datail!🤌
Glad you like it!
Just a suggestion on the shelves, instead of having the breadboard ends facing the cabinet sides try facing them front to back, much cleaner look. Beautiful piece and I love the contrast of the green paint!
Yeah, I thought of that when I put the shelves in the finished piece, especially since these ones are almost square it would've looked a little cleaner! Thanks for pointing that out though, it'll help me remember it on the next project!
When I first heard the word "Paint", I screamed NO!!! But as I watched I begin to like what your doing. The piece came out really nice and the "Paint" actually made the piece "Pop". Very nice work.
That's the exact reaction I wanted! It took alot of planning to pull off the painted look so I'm glad to hear you like it!
Beautiful work. As far as the paint great and practical.
Thanks, it nice to add a little color every once in a while!
Fantastic piece Morgan! You have a great sense of scale and proportion with your work, I can definitely see the Green and Green influence on this one. Thanks for the inspiration!
I've been looking at Greene & Greene furniture for a while now and haven't been able to wrap my head around it! Figured I would try out some smaller elements before taking them on to a larger project! Thanks for watching!
I used alder inside a cherry cabinet and it matches very well.
It was kind of shocking because I always thought cherry was such a unique color then I saw it beside alder and they really are a near perfect match!
Great project. Nice mix of woods and techniques. Painted finish looked good too.
Thank you, it was fun to try out some new stuff and see what works!
I’ve been woodworking for …..over 45 years and ,a you can imagine, I’ve seen huge changes in materials and techniques available to the smaller shop. The router and adhesive quality are probably the two biggest but even abrasives - when I started, we used dried fish skin (from a dog fish which is in the shark family).
Throughout, the key phrase for me is that taste is personal whilst skill is universal. When we built pieces for a client, there things that I didn’t like - were not to my taste - but the client wanted them. Notwithstanding the aesthetic, I hope the skill was still there.
Having said all that, it’s not a shy criticism of this piece. I like the aesthetic very much - it’s in the Arts and Crafts genre that I now building all my pieces within (UK A&C plus bits of Greene and Greene, Stickley etc.). Okay, I wouldn’t, personally, have the finger joints showing on the drawers - I don’t like them on G&G stuff - but I’m very fond of the visible pegs with the button tops. Again, G&G used them a lot but, apparently, often to hide the screw that secured the joint. I wouldn’t have believed that but it came from Darrell Peart and he is the expert.
I’m finishing the interior fit out of a converted barn and I think we are now past $30,000 of European oak for doors, stairs, trims etc. The colour we wanted was the fumed oak that was very popular around the end 19th/ early 20th century. I don’t know if you have actually fumed oak (with ammonia) but it’s a nasty process. So, I decided to stain the oak to that fumed oak colour.
Another popular stain was to apply ferrous acid (vinegar and steel solution). That ebonite’s timber with tannins and, of course, no shortage of tannin in oak. You can control the effect to go from grey to jet back. Contrast that to natural oak in a piece and I find the effect very pleasing.
I have painted wood on pieces (as opposed to the normal way of painting trim if you want a coloured finish) and I think the byword for me is “less is enough”. So, none of my pieces are fully painted but have highlights or insets of painted pieces.
In your piece, I think the choice of paint is excellent. It does, as others have said, go well with the colour of the natural timber. Unless I had something like ash lying around, I must admit that I would use poplar as it works and finishes superbly - and is much cheaper.
On the question of design. I guess I’m past the point where I think about technique and then design around using that technique. I’m at the stage where I think of a design and then work out how I’m going to make it. That process, for me, satisfies the key criteria of form and function. But, that’s just me.
Very much enjoyed this video from me. I’m off to check your playlist.
The painted wood with the natural looks amazing. Way to change it up.
Thanks, I've been trying to expand my boundaries and try some new stuff lately!
Gorgeous work as always. The paint looks great, I think letting the grain show through it is a crucial detail. This style of construction is beautiful im going to have to try it myself!
It definitely took a lot of testing to figure out the right combo to make sure that grain shows through but it was well worth the effort!
Two words…leaded glass!
It would be perfect
I want to so badly, I've been doing a ton of research into it and it's coming soon.
I'm also planning to take a stained glass course this year which should help making some exciting pieces!
I loved it and looked very good
Thanks!
I have to agree with you that wood, whenever possible, should be natural. But I really like all of the contrast that the painted wood, stained alder and the natural oak highlights bring together. Beautiful work!
Thanks! Paint is definitely one of those things that can be easily overdone, my plan for this style of painted furniture is to use it for one or two pieces in a room to add some pops of color here and there and break up the natural wood pieces.
Awesome work! Your craftsmanship is beyond incredible!
Thank you very much!
@@morganhurst_redridge you're very welcome Kind Sir!
For water based stains I mix dye stain and spray with hvlp gun saturating the piece then wipe off. I get very even results. Can be messy though. If you don’t have booth with good ventilation I suggest a good open space. This is a beautiful piece.
I've read some stuff about spraying stains but never really gave it much thought. Once the weather warms up, I'll have try taking a piece outside and spraying some stain!
Only because you asked! I think you did an amazing job, I love the paint and color. The only thing throwing me off are the two different shades of wood. Had they all been unstained or stained them all, I think it would have looked less busy. I’m a jerk. You asked. You’re still amazing!
This is the kind of constructive criticism I love to get!
I get what your saying, I decided on this project to break my standard rule of only having two colors because I thought the painted frame kind of "didn't count" as another color but it definitely holds alot more visual weight than I'd expected. It's been really interesting hearing what people think because some people like the busy look while others don't, and I'm stuck somewhere in between!
@@morganhurst_redridge I really appreciate your approach to design. I can tell it’s not an afterthought.
The paint with the wood looks great and so does the whole piece, however there are to manny colors/ textures for me personally. (Not a dig, just my taste) and I’d turn the shelves 90* if you do breadboard ends. There will still be plenty of strength especially on narrow widths and give a cleaner appearance.
I completely agree with you, way to many different colors, this was a bit of an experiment and good/hard lesson. I'm definitely going to keep it to one or two colors on future projects.
I dig it.
Ooohhhhh. Lots to unpack here.
1, the overal piece has a elevated green and green look. Think eclectic smoking room which is awesome.
2. The painted wood acentuates the stained wood, again elevating the look.
3. Box joints were a great choice.
4. The voice over is so much better than hearing the tablesaw and I like knowing what caused changes in the design. Its how I work. Happy accidents
This was definitely one of my more experimental projects and I'm glad to hear like it and the video!
I think there is a time and place for paint on wood. Using paint as an accent and intentional integration into the design for contrast and accent of the wood grain works. Too often paint is used to just cover up an older finish. I think you did really well with the ash and highlighting the texture of the wood and grain.
Exactly, I've wanted to use paint on a piece of furniture for a few months now but I had to do alot of experiments to figure out how to use it in a why that wouldn't look horrible. It took a while, but I do think this combination of paint, wood and finish is going to be my go to for adding some pops of color!
Occasional wood worker here, super nervous about color in general, never know what people will want/like. The more you deviate from natural tones the greater the risk. If I build it for my home I let the boss decide what she likes. Paint is a risk but such is life and this looks good
I fully agree with you, this is why I still try to avoid colors, because in some way it feels kind of wrong. I think the most important thing if you want to add color to a piece is that it needs to look very intentional!
I woodwork as well. I mostly prefer a natural finish like you normally do. However, from time to time I like to paint. Looks fine to me.
It does make it a little more interesting to mix it up every once in a while and I'm finding that having some natural wood and some colored/painted pieces helps bring a little more interest to a room!
Can you do a specific video on the door spacer piece? Like how you size the thickness to hinge thickness, door reveal, etc.? Love the videos!
I'm planning to get back into doing tutorials soon so I'll make sure that video is on the top of the list!
The jisk of it is that you want the spacer piece to be thick enough to fully hold your hinge and not break, I made these ones almost to thin but they still worked. By standard I go with 1/8", which works perfectly for the horton brasses hinges that are about 1/16" thick hinges leaves.
For door reveal I still mess that up constantly, but I'm getting slightly better each time! The defining factor for your door reveal is the hinge in it's closed position, so if you're working with hinges you haven't used before start by mortising them into a couple scrap pieces, then measure the gap in the "closed" position. Then just account for that gap around the whole door.
Then to figure out the door size just plug in the number, these are the one's I use for the horton brasses hinges.
Door Opening - 1/8" (Spacer) - 1/4" (1/8" reveal either side) = Door Width
I think Ash or Red Oak with the deep grain looks good painted a lot of the time. Or even maple if you want a flat smooth look. If you start to paint mahogany, that's heresy.
I did like Red Oak in my testing, I found that the grains were a little more subtle when painted than ash, kind of a nice inbetween of ash and maple. Red Oak definitely stains better than ash though and I'm going to be putting that to use in an upcoming project.
Well there goes my next project, I was really looking forward to making a mahogany cabinet then giving it a nice white paint job!
Thanks for sharing. Could you please talk more about the home made jig you have for the mortiser around the 4 minute mark? It looks interesting/useful. Many thanks.
I figured I might get some questions about that, it's a new addition that I'm just trying out at the moment and working out the kinks. There'll be a mk. II version after I've worked this out on a few project!
The basic idea is that I just wanted taller fences that would hold the pieces firmly in place because the wheels that come with the mortiser allow taller work pieces to pull away from the fence and angle the mortise. By locking the pieces between the two mdf fences the pieces can't angle at all! The other problem with the powermatic mortiser is that they put a hole in the base that pieces will rock into when cutting a mortise near the end of the board, so I add in a bottom piece of mdf to cover up that hole and on this project I was able to use it to cut through mortises cleanly.
It was an absolute game changer on this project and when I put together the better version I'll make a video explaining how to make it.
I think the cabinet looks great! Too pretty to hang in the shop. I really like the paint on this piece. I do think the breadboard ends on the shelves should go front to back. Just my opinion though.
Too pretty to hang where I was planning to as well, the spot I had planned was in a corner and just didn't do this piece justice!
I agree with you about the bread board ends, in hindsight it would've looked alot cleaner having the shelves turned 90 degrees. Normally I like having that little detail on the front edge of the shelves but I think on this cabinet it looks a little to busy.
Just found your channel. You have very nice design instincts sir. BTW I hope Lee Valley is taking good care of you 😁
Nice work. All the best
Thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed the project!
Awesome project. Do you have anything you can share on the jig you made for your Powermatic Mortimer? I have the same model. Thanks!
So, it's just version one at the moment and I'm planning to use it over a few projects before finalizing the design then I'll definitely be putting out a video on how to make them because even on this project it was an absolute game changer!
The biggest issue I've had with the mortiser is that those small wheels don't hold taller pieces tight enough against the fence and I keep ending up with angled mortises that then make the frames twisted. The taller fence on the back and the reinforced fence on the front hold the workpiece in place perfectly and I just rub paraffin wax on both fences and the pieces glide right through.
The other issue is that stupid hold in the base, when ever I try to cut mortises near the end of a board the pieces rock into the hole a screw up the mortise so I added a piece of MDF under the front fence and that solved that problem. It also let me cut through mortises much cleaner because the fibres are supported on the back side of the cut.
thank you Morgan . i can put up with a light coat of paint if it shows the grain this project looked good . question please do you like your pin nailer ? would you buy it again ?
That's my thinking to and why it took me so long to figure out how to paint wood in a way that doesn't look like a botched DIY job.
I would definitely recommend this pin nailer, I splurged a bit when I bought and it's been a really good reliable tool!
@@morganhurst_redridge thanks
I feel like you are judging my joinery practice in your voiceover at the beginning 😂😂
😉 No judgement here!
Excellent work. I am not a fan of the drawer fronts. Otherwise very thing looks very good.
👏👏👏👏👏👍
I just had a red oak tree fall in the yard. I call it raw material. The trunk is over 5 feet in diameter.
like it
Great craftsmanship! However, with all due respect, I feel it is a little to busy for me.
Thanks, and I understand what you're saying. This is definitely busier than the pieces I normally make, I wanted to kind of stretch the boundaries on this one and see how far I could go.
What would you remove or change to make it less busy?
Man can you talk! You should have been a woman! hehehe. I love that you explain all the steps. Some don't talk at all and I have to rewind to see what they are doing again. This is a gorgeous piece of furniture!
It’s occurred to me to wonder: how has paint changed since… oh I don’t know, say the late 1800s.
Maybe today’s paint is so much thicker than a century or so ago that painting fine woodworking just looks terrible. 🤔
I actually did a decent amount a research into this while trying to figure out this technique and from what I found the two most common traditional paints were milk (water based) paint and linseed oil paint. What I found most interesting is that the pigments used in transitional paints aren't all the different from what we use to today, the main differences is the hardeners. Milk paint used lime and clay while modern paint uses latex, so it's actually kind of the opposite from what you said. Traditional paint sits thicker on the surface of wood and that's why when you see alot of older painted furniture the paint is chipping off, where modern paints are less likely to do that since they are thinner but the layers have much stronger bonds.
I did alot of testing because I thought that answer to painting furniture nicely was going to be milk paint but after a ton of trial and error it turned out that some simple latex paint from home depot that was sprayed on gave the best results. My conclusion was that because the modern paint has stronger bonds, that allowed me to thin it down enough to allow it to soak into the pores of the wood.
The other massive part of this combination is the wood, no other wood except for ash looks good when painted. Even red oak which was a close second was just not porous enough to have a nice amount of the grain showing through. Ash just has such massive pores that paint can easily work its way in. It's even better if you use the really young ash sapwood because that has even larger pores and the grain shows right through the paint!
@@morganhurst_redridge you’ve given me a lot to think about. I’m planning to building a wood frame for some art we have and my wife said she wants a black frame. I was thinking of using cherry then painting it with black milk paint. I was also thinking about ebonizing the wood (there’s a video that shows a technique using tea and iron dissolved into vinegar that looks really effective). I don’t have an airbrush so I’m left to experiment with other techniques.
My impression about the thickness of paint was based on paint I bought over the years. It seems way thicker now than it used to be. I’m not a century old but assumed older paint was thinner and didn’t cover as well. 😛
I use to make alot of picture frames and the best combo I found for a pure black finish is ash or oak and india ink. That give you a pure black while still showing some nice grain patterns. Ebonizing is also really cool technique and definitely worth experimenting with, I found through some testing that is tends to give you black/grey coloring with strong purple/blue undertones which is a very unique look. It can be unpredictable which is why I haven't used it yet on a piece of furniture but someday I want to try it again!
really, I couldnt continue watching because of your non stop talk.
Your first comment of "too much talk." was very straightforward and to the point but then you felt the need to leave this second comment with even more words. One might say you comment too much?
Bro, my ears bleeding…
Did you know you can control the volume yourself? Just press the buttons on the side of your phone and it won't be loud enough to make your ears bleed.
too much talk.
Turn the sound down then.
Great woodworking, great explanation of techniques…However, for a 30+ minute video, a little too much commentary for my taste.
I get not everyone likes the commentary, I have another channel that's just the shop sounds if that's something that interests you - www.youtube.com/@redridge-shopsounds
@@morganhurst_redridge no no no, don’t misunderstand me, I enjoy commentary. It helps to understand the video. I just think your videos would do better if they were a bit shorter and a little less commentary. Not telling you to BE like anyone else, but the channels that do well have shorter videos and less commentary.