I recently set up a decent little vanity for the wife. She requested a little trash can for her makeup wipes and such.
She wanted it to sit on her vanity top. It’s not often I get to make her something useful out of wood given my 8”x8”x3” work area.
But this presents a perfect opportunity to flex some wood working muscles. I went with a very simple design of a traditional square can with a slightly smaller bottom than top. Lofted them together and give some curvature for visual interest.
This corner with the small plant is about 120mm cubed. (I’ve gone with all fake plants since she’s never been able to keep any real ones alive )
Mill with 1/4” two flute down cut for most of it. Ideally I’d use a 45 degree v for finishing the edges but I’ve only got a 60 degree so I ended up using a ball mill. It’s fine, just takes a bit longer.
Honestly the birch ply came out better than I expected but I started this project with the intent to practice veneer. I’ll likely vacuum seal them but I went with a roller and spray adhesive to see what it looks like.
The bottom is a standard square with straight sides. The interior is flat and the edges are standard 45 degree. So I didn’t bother mocking up two sides and cutting the square.
I’ve got a sheet of maple veneer on the way as well as some veneer glue (apparently it’s thicker so there’s less opportunity for bleed through ) and softening spray.
Should be a quick project over the weekend.
The wife requested two special features that I’m not sure how to pull off yet:
A smooth interior that makeup is less likely to stick to and gum up. (I’m looking at some spray poly stuffs though a thin resin coat should work as well)
A quick release bottom so she can just push through instead on having to tip the can and tap out stuck items.
My plan for 2 is currently a magnetic base that’s simply attached to the can with a leather strap. That seems much simpler than trying to do a hinge or anything like that considering the can needs to sit flat still.
I’ll update this post when the products come in and the can is finished up,
It’s almost certainly not the most economic way to source ply but woodcraft has a sale going on for $5 a square foot of Baltic birch. Since I don’t have the facilities to break down a large piece, I appreciate the smaller segments.
One of these should be enough for a full trash can putting me at about $8 in raw material after veneer and such. Not great, not terrible
The veneer meant for this project should arrive tomorrow but I might get a practice piece in tonight with some padauk for fun. Not sure where I’d put it since I don’t have the need for a tiny trash can but maybe that’s a problem for future me to solve.
Couple of different shots of it glued together. Feedback from the wife is ~it’s pretty but she’s not sold on the curves. They give it more style but she’s not sure if it fits with the relatively squared vanity.
She gets one more modification before I start charging for design time
I feel your pain. The person with whom I cohabitate would want the curves to match the shelf beside it.
Every project I do I hear…“Looks nice but I would have…” Thats when I kick her out of the garage and start making noise so I can’t hear her
She ended up choosing “one straight side with the rest being curved still.” So it looks identical from most angles but the profile sits flat against the vanity.
So we go from one piece with one set of tool paths and no orientation to speak of…to 4 unique pieces requiring unique toolpaths, a required tool change, and unique workholding for each op2.
Crazy how a relatively minor change can blow up the time like that.
I’ve got another project set up currently and waiting for tooling today. So she gets to wait until next week…or maybe much later depending on how cutting this chunk of steel goes
(Hopefully the altin coated tools are worth the expense)
In the meantime, I might print out a sticker for the Kleenex box like Tex suggested
)
) and softening spray.
The person with whom I cohabitate would want the curves to match the shelf beside it.
