Walnut Cabinet

About five years ago I got very ambitious and bought a couple hundred dollars' worth of slabs of black walnut from a mill.  I chose carefully so I'd get all that grain that's on the cusp -- you can buy black walnut that's uniform, like the good craftsmen do, but I like to get it right in the zone where heartwood meets sapwood and there are reds, blues, cremes along with the dark walnut.  It was too thick for my dovetail jigs, so I cut the dovetails by hand the best way I could.  And I took a long walnut 2x8 and hollowed out six drawers, solid blocks like little dugout canoes.  And I chose pieces carefully and sliced them into slats, book-matched them and glued them into doors.  And there was more too.

I finally got intimidated by the size of the job and put it aside for several years.  Last year it started talking to me out in the shop, and I found in the years that have passed I've got the patience to take it on and finish it now. So I've come a long way but still have some more to do -- don't like the darkness of one of the drawers and have chosen another one that matches better but have to finish it now.  I originally bought lots of pen blanks (little 1x1x5-inch blocks folks who are more patient than I am make presentation fountain pens out of, lots of expensive blocks of pink ivory (it's a rare wood, not real ivory from late 1950s elephants) to make the drawer pulls and door pulls out of.  But I'm having second thoughts now cause the walnut is so rich I don't want to detract from it with something flashy.  I may machine walnuts pulls, or use ebony or steel, I dunno.  I have some bronzed cable pulls I made that might be just dignified and classy enough.

The back is reversible -- it has walnut ply on one side and that rich paisley fabric on the other.  Or you could put something else.