George Nakashima Coffee Table....

For a long time now, I have been a fan of George Nakashima's wood working skills. http://www.nakashimawoodworker.com/ For those not familiar with his work, I left the URL to his website. Unfortunately, he is no longer with us. He passed away in 1990 at the age of 85.

His work is in many museums and to see his furniture in person, is to stand in awe. I once got to sit in one of his chairs!

At my first NAME National House Party, I had the good fortune to find Goode Woods in the sales room. I purchased quite a bit of unusual woods from them. That was back in the early 80s. I have been saving some of that stash for something special.

Earlier this week I picked up a copy of the latest House Beautiful magazine. The subtitle on the cover was "The New Look of Wood". I flipped through it and found a one page article on Mr. Nakashima. That got me thinking. I looked at some of his work and something clicked.

In the stash, I had some very imperfect apricot slabs....Perfect for something Nakashima.

I looked some of his stuff up on the net, got some measurements of a table that I liked and went to work. Of course, his tables are one of a kind, made from solid slabs of trees, so I couldn't reproduce one exactly. So I went for one that came close to the wood that I had on hand.

This is the top of the table after cutting, sanding and oiling. The wood was so dry that I had to either wet it or oil it to see what it was going to look like when finished. It comes close to the tops that he is famous for in normal size.

I opted for a "sled" base. In truth, this is from the 80s, but I am cheating. Tessie will never know it's not one of his 60s tables if you don't tell her.....

It was love at first sight. She Ohh-ed and Ahh-ed over it. She definitely wants it for the townhouse.

Her comment? "Hey! You made a table that matches my hair! I like it."

I never said that she made a lot of sense. If she likes it, she's happy. That's the main thing.

Here's a shot of the other side.

I still need to let the oil soak in and then wax it with paste wax.

Actually, I just noticed, that it matches my hair too. My apologies to Mr. Nakashima. That's not the only reason that I am happy with the results. Thank you for all of your wonderful furniture designs.

I think that there will be more of this kind of furniture in my future. Maybe a few tutorials too.

See you tomorrow.