Tom’s Modern Coffee Table

Viewer Project - By Tom from London, Ontario, Canada
Added on November 30, 2007

My name is Tom and I am from London Ontario area (that’s Canada) and I’ve been woodworking and apprenticing for about 6 years making furniture and built-in cabinetry.

This is a coffee table I built recently. I wanted to try something with a floating top, and contrasting woods. I think the floating top lets you show off some joinery underneath it, I used sliding dovetails for the legs and some dovetails on the stretcher supports. The top is made of some birdseye hard maple and the base and legs are walnut.

I finished it using a blend of linseed oil, turpentine and varnish. It was my first time trying that mix, and found that it took a long time to get any film build at all (about 5 or 6 coats on top). I’ll maybe try a different ratio to get more solids into the finish next time. Hope you like it.

Discussion

baldy November 30, 2007 4:29 pm

That is awesome work!! Love the contrast especially in the dovetail joints!! Bravo my fellow Canuck!!! I aspire to be that precise!! Thanks for the inspiration.

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Al Navas November 30, 2007 4:30 pm

Beautiful, and outstanding craftsmanship, Tom! I look forward to seeing more of your projects; I am glad you shared your work with Marc, or I likely would have missed it.

—— Al

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Mike November 30, 2007 8:57 pm

Very nice coffee table, Tom. I really like that you can see the dovetail details and the use of contrasting woods. My question is, how did you “float” the top?
Or, from where is it mounted and with what? I would really like to see the under side of this piece. Great job!
Mike

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Mitch Cutler December 1, 2007 12:28 am

Nice table!

I like the contrast and the detail of the dovetails. Did you cut those in one pass or run a straight bit through first and then use the dovetail bit?

I like the angles too. Must have been some fancy jigs to get everything right.

Keep up the good work!

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Mattias in Durham, NC December 1, 2007 5:44 am

Very nice!

The 1st and 3rd photos are almost the same – can we have another one of joinery instead?

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muddler mike December 1, 2007 6:42 am

really nice Tom. Understated, with hidden treasures! Great combo of woods, joinery, and design. It’s one of those pieces that kind of makes you keep looking at it.

Mike

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jim_ny December 1, 2007 10:47 am

very nice I to love the looks of the sliding dove tails, on the stretchers did you have the dovetails slide all the way down or did you stop short of the bottom again very nice work

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Kip December 1, 2007 12:12 pm

Most enjoyable!

Keep up the outstanding work.Its obvious you have well developed design skills in your use of wood color and unique joinery. Please keep sharing,

Kip

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Tomcat1066 December 1, 2007 3:39 pm

Wow! Very nice piece. I especially love how the top seems to float about the base. It makes for a very interesting effect.

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Mike in St. Paul December 1, 2007 7:37 pm

Tom –

In a word: COOL!

Very well done, sir. I wish I had one like that for my living room. Truly awesome job.

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Tom December 2, 2007 6:33 pm

Thanks for all the compliments folks….glad we have a site like this to chit-chat about woodworking! To answer a few questions, the “floating top” is actually just sitting on the 2 maple stretchers going across the middle of the of the apron. Atop the stretchers are 7/8″ spacers (also of maple), that are set back enough that you cant see them unless you look for them (about 3-1/2″) . I just predrilled and shot some screws through the stretcher and spacers, into the top (this may lead to some shrinking/expanding problems i know). And Mitch, i cut the sliding dovetails in one pass on a router table, its not much of an issue, the only thing is you should have a sturdy stop block set up because the bit does like to climb into the wood, a straight bit relief would be good for a less powerful router though, and probobly better on the bit itself too. The stretcher dovetails are just handcut 1/2 blind dovetails. Pretty straightforward; cut a tail, mark it on the apron, and cut the slot. Easy to do when you only have 1 tail and 1 slot to cut (easier than hand cutting drawer sides of multiple pins and tails). Thanks again for all the comments and im looking forward to seeing everyone elses projects…TOM

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Edwin from Toronto December 3, 2007 10:15 am

Very nice project Tom!

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Tom’s Modern Coffee Table

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