What makes a cutting board and how to care for it

Function 

• A cutting board shout be easy on knives but at the same time hard and well wearing
• Wood for boards should be non porous and well seasoned with a non toxic mineral oil and bees wax
• A board should be flat (sit firmly on your counter top)
• It should have sufficient mass (heavy enough to accomplish the task but be easy to move around your kitchen)
• It should be constructed from non toxic waterproof glue

Form

• A cutting/serving board should be simple, beautiful, and tactile

Care

• Cleaning can be accomplished with a dry or warm damp cloth
• Boards can also be occasionally washed with soap and warm water but not submerged and they should be re seasoned afterward
• After washing boards they should be stored carefully on edge to dry
• Boards should be dry when they are re seasoned
• Maintain seasoning with mineral oil or beeswax polish
• Regular maintenance will keep the boards looking fresh. Just a lite wiping with oil or wax
• Resurfacing can be accomplished with a red scotchbrite pad or fine steel wool
• You may wish to dedicate one side for cutting and the other for serving or display

Cheers Wayne

making an end grain cutting board

Recently I began an exploration into the construction of segemented end grain cutting boards(or butcher blocks). This mostly began by request of local culinary shop owner Carrie Wreford of  Bradshaw's of Stratford . She challenged me to create something uniquely "Muma" and of lasting quality. I wanted to create both individually unique boards with an acceptable small scale production process. As it turned out this exploration presented artistic, technical, and process challenges. Not as easy as I expected. I also expected that I would need a small scale production thickness sander to accomplish the production time efficiently. Another noisy dusty machine to clutter up my already cramped shop. As I started experimenting with these machines a few serious shortcomings became apparent. First of all, I would need large batches of very consistently thick "board blanks" to make the process efficient. This was going to severely limit my creative process (another whole blog discussion). On top of which these blanks would still need a significant amount of random orbital sanding. Which for me defeated the idea of using a production sander in the first place. Frustrated I turned to my low angle hand planes to see if I could come up with a process to surface end grain cutting boards. I am finding huge benefits to using my #62 low angle jack plane. I am achieving a flatter surface and removing milling marks as or more time efficiently without the use of noisy dusty machines. Crazy as it sounds I will be hand smoothing my end grain cutting boards with low angle planes. The #62 low angle jack was put into production in 1905 and discontinued in 1942 until it's present day resurrection by Lie-Nielsen Tools. Please check out my cutting boards at Bradshaw's of Stratford. 

making wayne's bench

Recently I decided to build another bench. Crazy as it sounds the decision process in designing your own bench is a very difficult thing. Maybe it is the OCD that is in all woodworkers. We just don't want to get it wrong and we have to live with the thing for many years. Maybe we think we have something to prove.  I tell the ego that is inside me that if it is a problem just build another one. And so there will be probably be a few more benches in me. Mostly because they are fun to build. The tail vise design was created by JeremyTomlinson of  The Urban Woodworker .  It is a modified version of a Scandinavian vise sold by Lie Nielsen Tools . It is a simple design but the more I use it the more I like it. Thank you Jeremy.  The other vise is  The chain drive hardware from Lie-Nielsen. Very nice vice but it wasn't a wise decision for me to put it on the end although I love the ergonomics. Wood movement may cause a problem.

Wayne

storing and drying hardwood

Maintaining proper moisture content in hardwoods, storage, and seasoning air dried woods can be overwhelming. My storage room solves these problems for me. It maintains a moisture content of 8 % in my stored woods while gently seasoning air dried woods that I bring in from outside and provides a significant amount of storage. Well seasoned hardwoods from outside reach an equilibrium in my room in about 3 to 12 months depending on thickness. Check out my utube video. 

Ontario Crafts Council`s IDS14 display

The Ontario Crafts Council has generously included one of my tables into their display at The Interior Design Show 14 . Please come and check out their display and see what craft is all about in Ontario.

 

The completed bar for CUTMR 11

 

 

The bar table for CUTMR 11 is finally complete. She is making a brief appearance at the Mayor's Gala to display 100 bottles of wine to generate monies for The Stratford Perth Community Foundation today. Then she is off to Toronto to The Gladstone Hotel tomorrow.

She will be displayed on the second floor lobby under a canopy of lights designed by Hilary and Tim. It is an ironic pairing of sorts because I began woodworking as a paddle and boatbuilder. I drew heavily on my old boat fairing skills to shape the base. Our pairing was quit accidental.

 

Creating the bar for CUTMR 11 - a photo essay

Here is a photo essay of construction details of the CUTMR 11 bar.

I created a specifically shaped Krenov hand plane to create the inside curve on the base. Check out the process in this video.

I created another Krenov wooden hand plane to do the final surface smoothing on the table top surface. Check out the hand planing techniques in this video.

In this video I am cutting and fitting the dovetail tenon joinery for the base.

Visit the Gladstone Hotel for CUTMR 11.
 

http://gladstonehotel.com/hotel

creating a walnut slab coffee table

 

This is a photo essay of the construction details of the above slab coffee table.

Our January Arctic Vortex

This is the aftemath of the storm that froze the water pipe at the Gladstone Hotel and buried my workshop