Wooden jewellery box, presentation box, personalised box, handmade box

Drawers

This page shows you how I make the drawers for my boxes. They are traditionally made using dovetails. The drawer bottom sits in a groove which runs around the sides and the front. The drawer featured is one of two made for a collector's box. The front is in walnut with a burr walnut face, it also has cock beading applied to it. The rest of the drawer is made in maple.Click on images to enlarge.

Before I start work on the dovetails I use a block plane to get rid of any marks left from the machinery used to convert the timber from a rough sawn board.

Here I am marking out where the tails will be on the drawer sides.

Once the tails are cut the pins are marked out. The dovetails on the front of the drawer are known as "stopped" or "blind". The dovetails I use for jointing the boxes are called "through" dovetails. Here I am chopping out the front to accept the side tails.

For more information about the process of cutting dovetails please go to the dovetails page.

This is a dry fit to see how the joint comes together.

The back of the drawer is positioned to allow the drawer bottom to slide into place from the back.

The pieces forming the compartments fit in housings.

The cock beading is made with African blackwood. I machined strips of wood over length and routed a "half round" molding on one edge.

Here I have put a groove in a piece of mdf for the beading to sit in. I plane the edge until the plane touches the mdf. This insures all the strips are the same width.

The beading sits on a rebate machined around the front of the drawer. I scored the burr veneer with a marking gauge to help prevent the veneer from chipping.

This is a simple jig made to cut the mitres for the molding.

The chisel is guided by the face of the wood.

The cock beading is glued onto the drawer front after a rebate is formed. This image shows the side of the drawer front ready to accept a short piece of molding.

I used black velvet to line the bottom of the drawer.