The Mirror

Nikki had wanted a full length mirror for a long time, but it was one of those things that you think of when you’re nowhere near one, and then when you see one you want, they want silly money for it. Anyway good people, this is where my relationship with carving began. One afternoon I was sitting around daydreaming about things I wanted to do but never seemed to have time for. I found myself sketching ideas for a full length dressing mirror for Nikki. Here are the sketches I did. 

[Concept sketches for the mirror]

There came a point where I decided I’d have a crack at making it and I was fascinated, once again, with some of the beautiful mdf carvings I’d seen recently (Unitec Marae). The day I started using powertools to carve was the day I started carving. Ha! I can guess what some of you might be thinking. And yes, I had originally thought of keeping it real, doing it the old fashioned way etc. But inversely, I decided, rightly or wrongly, that had the artisans had access to power tools back in the dark ages, they would have been firing up their jigsaws and angle grinders before you could say ‘architrave’. I also have so many ideas that impatience got the better of me, and I found that speeding up the process meant I could manifest more ideas more quickly.

All pieces are made mostly from mdf (medium density fibreboard). Other parts are made from pine.  I’m predominantly using a handheld jig-saw and angle grinder to create and carve the initial shapes ( I don’t have any specialist or large format pro tools). Anyway, they’re then sanded, stained and polyurethaned. I always sketch the design first, usually directly onto the raw board before cutting. I’ve made a couple of pieces that weren’t right, which I’ve shelved. Here's a photo of the feet.

[Mirror foot]

Both feet were carved from mdf sheet. The top one is ready for staining. The bottom foot is shown in the state before sanding.

Here is the frame itself. This was constructed from one complete piece of mdf sheet. The 1200mm x 600mm sheet cost about $11(NZD) at the local hardware store. This was the first part of the mirror that I made.  Congratulations, you guessed it, a flower theme! We have a Hibiscus tree outside our bedroom window, hence the central flower at the top. I quickly discovered that before you start hacking away at your first carving, you need a design theme. That design theme needs to flow through the entire project. I decided that sketching the entire project was the best thing to do. BUT, I also discovered that as I got further into it, I had new ideas to try that I hadn’t considered at the outset. I decided early on, to allow myself to deviate from the initial design, so that it gave me the freedom to develop new ideas and techniques.

So this is the finished frame. Obviously, it needs a sheet of mirror glass which I’ll add as the last thing. Note the profiled vertical sides done with a handheld plunge router. The drawn flowers didn’t turn out the way I wanted - a bit of a bummer! However, as a first carving project, I’m actually really pretty stoked with how it’s turning out.

Below is an image of the finished foot. The design is my own. It’s no claim to fame, but as it’s the first heavily carved thing I’ve made in my life, I’m generally pleased with it. It has 2 different coloured stains to achieve the ‘antique’ look, and a couple of brushed coats of semi-gloss clear polyurethane.

[Finished mirror foot]

A Tip to improve your relationship and general well-being

For those guys who struggle to get enough cave time to satisfy those primal carving urges:  

Make something nice for your wife/girlfriend/partner.

It’s a bit sneaky, I know, and my project didn’t start out like that. I quickly realised that the times when Nikki poked her nose into the garage to see what I was doing, she’d become quite excited. “Look what I made you”, I’d say, waving around a finished mirror foot. “It’s got a flower theme, what do you think”? I always get a fairly generous helping of “ooohs” and “aaahs” and general ‘A level’ compliments. There you are you see, everyone’s happy!

So, you’re still with me? Great! If you haven’t guessed already, this is a work in progress. I’m pondering the cross-bar. The cross-bar joins to the verticals at the bass. The first one I made (shown below) was too elaborate, but it is evident that I’m now able to carve more interestingly than I could 6 weeks ago when I started this. This is the last piece to make before I put it all together. I’ll have to update this on the next blog. I’m going to make something less elaborate but not sure what yet.

Thanks for hanging in there with me on this fairly long blog. As I mentioned earlier, I’ve got a lot of other project ideas in the wings and these will be the focus of following blogs. I wanted to add one final thing. Dreaming and creating in this manner is an extremely satisfying pastime. Why? Because I work at my own pace and it’s a fantastic stress release after a shitty day at work. It also requires patience, and patience is something I need more practise on J. But there’s more than that. You can create something beautiful, which you can then pass on to someone else if you want. Finally, I’m doing this blog because I’ve never kept a diary on anything in my life! When I first got interested in this several months ago, I struggled to find helpful information on the web. So, if you’re digging this, then I hope this is helpful information. Feel free to post questions and I’ll reply in my subsequent posts.

Amos

Making Timber Wall Panels

A blog adventure about beautifying my home.

Thanks for stopping by. I’m Amos, I live in Auckland, New Zealand and I’m still wondering why I decided to start this blog, but here goes. 

It all came about after returning home from a year’s holiday in Europe with my wife Nikki in 2009. I was deeply struck by the beauty and history of the buildings and I felt this increasing need to surround myself with beautiful things. I was fascinated by the palaces, abbeys, castles, churches and cathedrals. I found myself awe-struck by the energy and the affect of these beautiful places. We couldn’t drive past a castle or church without me sticking my nose in for a ‘quick’ look. This happened all through Europe. I couldn’t, and still can’t explain, the very deep tugs I felt. I began to feel more and more uncomfortable with the prospect of returning to a home with predominantly painted plasterboard walls and I just knew that I needed to change this.

So I started planning on how I could beautify our home, and was keen to give it a go myself. I’ll add that I have worked as an architectural designer for many years with some building experience. So this blog is intended as an on-going diary of events; my plans and ideas along with all the outcomes.

The Bedroom Beautification Project

Nikki and I settled on ‘beautifying’ our bedroom since it’s the one space in our home that we have our first and last impressions of the day. I actually lost sleep over this! I know, it sounds ridiculous, but ideas were abound. These initially gravitated around the use of ornate plaster cornices, carved timber wall panelling, ceiling panelling, up-lighting (rah rah rah). In the end I decided on a contemporary style of timber wall panelling to two walls with Anaglypta (heavily embossed) wallpaper on the remaining two opposing walls. I was about to embark on selecting a suitable timber plywood for the timber wall panels. At the same time, I’d been messing around with the idea of creating faux timber panels using mdf (particle board) and a variety of wood stains to create realistic looking timber. It was curiosity as much as anything. A part of me was saying “use real timber”, and another part was saying “try the mdf, see what you can do”. So, having given myself a bit of a challenge, I started trying out different techniques and fairly soon, came up with this:

[600mm x 600mm wall panels]

I was really digging how good I thought this looked, so I made a few more panels and tried to make them all a little different; some with knots and swirls and growth rings using different stain colours. The panels had a very nice walnut look. I finally decided I’d go with this design. The other attraction was that the panels were significantly more affordable than timber. So I made around 30 panels and glue-fixed them to the wall in a grid with a negative detail (gap) between each panel. The gaps were painted with acrylic chocolate brown before installing the panels. My wife loved it! Bonus J. The difference in the way the room feels is amazing! It seems to have a level of warmth, depth and beauty not there before. I’m about to put wallpaper up on the remaining two walls. Nikki and I have slightly different preferences on the wallpaper so I agreed to hang a few drops of her fave pick and if we like it, I’ll finish the room with it. It’s not Anaglypta, but it’s still a nice design that’ll go well with the panels. I’ve never been one for wallpaper, that is, until I started noticing some of the old Anaglypta wallpapers in buildings around Europe. After returning home, I discovered a wallpaper shop five minutes drive from home that specialises in, you guessed it, Anaglypta. Here’s my first pick for our bedroom.

[My Anaglypta wallpaper choice]

Anyway, back to the timber look. Here’s a question you might ask and one I asked myself often:

Question: Why not use real timber for these timber panels?

Answer: Firstly, good quality timber with a nice grain and colour is expensive. Secondly, it can be harder to work than mdf and mdf is more stable as long as it stays dry. I also wanted to have a go at creating something.

Before I sign off, I’ll say that as of July 2010, this is a work in progress. I have other rooms in our house that I’ll create these panels for. It also happens that I have a room that I’m fortunate enough to call a library and for that I intend to create a far more elaborate version of the wall panelling used in our bedroom.

Anyway, that’s my introduction. Feel free to post any questions – I’m happy to share what I’m doing. I'll post again soon. I have another more interesting project I'm working on.