DIY Table-Style Bathroom Vanity With Drawers – Finished! (Part 2 — Making Drawer Fronts)


Yesterday, I showed you the finished DIY table-style bathroom vanity I made for our master bathroom remodel. So today, I want to back up a bit and show the step-by-step process of how I made the drawer fronts.

This is Part 2 of this vanity project. You can click here to find Part 1 which shows the basic construction for the table base and drawer boxes. So here is another view of the finished vanity with the drawer fronts finished and attached.

Hopefully you can see that the drawer fronts are made of a frame with a recessed panel placed inside. The frame is cut from solid walnut lumber, and the recessed panel is 1/2-inch plywood covered with walnut wood veneer.

With that basic information in mind, let me show you how I made these drawer fronts.

I started with 1″ x 3″ walnut wood and cut it into pieces that were usually large square dowels. (The 1″ board is 3/4-inch thick, so I set up my table saw fence to break the 3/4-inch width and cut the pieces so they are 3/4- inch by 3/4-inch.) Then I measured the thickness of the material I would use for the recessed panels (two thicknesses of walnut veneer and a piece of 1/2-inch plywood). That measurement was approximately 5/8-inch, so I set my blade to that depth, and placed the fence over 1/4-inch from the blade, and ran all the pieces through the saw. to make the first cut of. make the rabbet to hold the recessed panel.

And then I flipped the piece over and repositioned the saw blade and fence so that the next pass could remove that piece completely. This step took me a couple of tries to get right, and I ended up breaking a couple of walnut pieces. But here’s what the profile looks like after both cuts are made. The thin side left (facing left) is the top of the frame, and the thick side left (facing up) is the side of the frame.

It is very important to cut all the pieces at the same time. In other words, I’m making two vanities and a storage cabinet, so I cut all the frame pieces with my table saw at the same time. That way they will all be completely consistent. I find that if I have to go back and cut pieces like that again, and try to get the set on my saw the same way I got it the first time, it’s almost impossible to get it right . And when that happens, assembling frames with parts that come from different pieces cut at different times can cause problems that result in less desirable results.

With all the pieces cut, I used my miter saw to cut the individual pieces for the frames, mitering each end at a 45-degree angle.

To assemble the frames, I used wood glue and 5/8-inch 18-gauge nails. If you don’t want to use nails, you can use glue and 45-degree clamps. I’m more of an instant gratification kind of person, so waiting for wood glue to dry is never my style. 😀 That’s why I chose the instant gratification of nailing the pieces.

As I worked around each frame, I used three nails (these nails are very small) in each corner – two from the right side (one at the top, one at the bottom), and one centered from the bottom . See the arrows in the image below if that description doesn’t make sense.

Here’s what the back of the frame looks like when it’s assembled.

And here’s a look at the front.

I am very happy with my mitered corners, but I always fill my mitered corners with sand on every project I do, so this was no exception. I used Goodfilla water-based wood filler in walnut to fill the mitered joints and the nail holes in the sides.

After it dried, I sanded the frame by hand with 120-grit sandpaper. I usually sand my project down to 220-grit, but the instructions for the clear finish I’m going to use on this vanity say to sand down to 120-grit. You can see below the sanded frame compared to the unsanded frame.

Here’s a look at how the edges turned out after sanding.

Next, I used my table saw and miter saw to cut pieces of 1/2-inch plywood for the inserts.

To adhere the walnut wood veneer, I used Weldwood Contact Cement and a 4-inch roller.

I applied two coats of contact cement to the plywood and the back of the veneer, letting it dry completely between coats (which only took a few minutes).

And then I carefully sanded the veneer and smoothed it over the plywood. You can only do one thing with this. If you get it crooked, there’s no going back. These small pieces are easy to work with, but larger pieces require more care and patience.

Then I took a piece of walnut and sanded the edges so they weren’t too sharp…

And I use the piece of walnut to burnish the walnut veneer and make sure it’s perfectly flat and smooth, and there are no air bubbles or ridges of contact cement trapped underneath.

I repeated this process on the back of the plywood as well. The only difference is that for the front, I pre-cut the veneer. Since the front edges are hidden by the frame, they do not need to be precisely cut. For the back, I cut pieces of veneer slightly larger than the plywood, and then after they were adhered, I carefully trimmed the excess with an X-Acto knife to give the edges a cleaner and more precise look. .

Then I placed the veneered plywood onto the frame, and secured the pieces with additional 5/8-inch 18-gauge finish nails at the corners (not shown below because I forgot to take a picture of them after nailing it in place).

But you can see it in this picture below. I could have covered with wood and drilled those little nail holes, but honestly, they didn’t bother me.

But I want to make sure the backs of the drawer fronts have walnut veneer because the backs are visible in the mirror when the drawers are open. Also, it is a good practice to cover both sides of the plywood. If you do one part, your painted plywood will warp more easily. That’s not an issue with smaller pieces like this, but it’s definitely an issue with larger pieces. So it is a good practice to always veneer both sides.

To attach the drawer fronts to the drawer boxes, I used wood glue (slower drying but longer) and hot glue (for instant hold).

On the middle fake drawer front, I used a little hot glue on the back of the drawer front to attach it, and then I went back with the four scrap pieces of wood, and glued the pieces to the back of the drawer . front and the side frame of the base of the vanity.

And then the drawers are ready for their jewelry…

This was a really fun project, and I’m really happy with how it turned out! Now I need another vanity and a storage cabinet, and that will wrap up the big projects in this bathroom.



Source link

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *