I’ve begun work on a pair of contemporary styled console tables. They will serve as either hall tables or console tables depending on the application. These pieces are purely speculative and therefore I have the liberty of pursuing some designs I’ve had in my mind for a while now. The overall dimensions of either of the tables is similar but they differ in style. One of the hall tables incorporates curves in the legs and top whereas the second table has angular features. After some experimentation with sketches, drawings and small models I finalized the designs. I purposely designed these tables to have different styling from each other whereas the aesthetic I am following is similar for the most part. In other words, the hall tables are not very radically different.

I’m combining both metal and wood in these designs which greatly appeals to me. I could easily substitute the metal components with wood if I so choose in subsequent versions of these tables. I thought to see how this combination works as I have had reasonable success combining wood and metal before. The woods I use are also quite different. In the first photo, the tabletop and leg components of the curved table are cherry whereas in the second table the table top and leg components are mahogany. You can also see the curved profile of the cherry tabletop above and the angular profile of the mahogany tabletop to the left. I also use some wenge for detail. I would say I am close to completion at this point and should have everything complete in a matter of days. I also took the liberty to begin finishing the first of these console tables, the cherry version. In the second photo I am scraping the bevelled edges of the mahogany table top. I will post photos of the completed console tables in a few days.

A while ago I had the opportunity to receive a challenging commission. This commission consisted of a fairly large wall art installation. The overall dimensions arrived at were approximately 8 ft wide and 32 inches high. The wall art was intended to be the focal point of a long wall in the living area of a home. The clients wanted something different and interesting, in a modern, contemporary style. Through a few exchanges of sketches and drawings with the clients, we arrived at a contemporary wall art design the client was very happy with.

The initial step after the design process was to create a maquette or small scale model of the art. This is something I enjoy doing as it is fairly straightforward and provides a fairly accurate representation and 3-D view of the art. Otherwise, I am limited to perspective drawings which are great but limited in accurately representing the depth and relationship of components within the art. The initial maquette developed from initial sketches is above and we worked from this to refine the design. It can be seen that there are more tubular components in this maquette than in the next photo. The next photo represents the woods selected as well as some of the components necessary to attach the woods together to create the design. The clients were seeking a fairly unique piece of art for their wall and we decided on unusual woods for the larger components. This choice of wood was ash with intense spalting. The middle wood was bocote which served to contrast well with the very light, spalted ash top and bottom pieces. The dark bocote also brought the dark streaks in the spalted ash together in the art.

The orientation of the pieces and the resulting offset layout form the basis for the modern, contemporary design. Offsetting the outside pieces allowed the components to span a greater width while forming the unique design. The design itself is kind of light and accentuates the negative space of the wall itself. The art is not smothering the wall but instead forms a series of light components joined together very minimally with tubular metal.