Bean Stool

This is the first piece of proper furniture I made. It was done through a class offered at the Hamilton Craft Studios (HCS). Great instructor, led us through making a staked table as outlined in Chris Schwarz’s book The Anarchist’s Design Book. I didn’t know I was going to be making a staked table before starting the class so I wanted to impart some design on it some way. When it came to shaping the top, last minute I panicked and scribbled down a bean shape that I'd been mulling over a few nights earlier and went for it on the band saw. I was happy with the results.

I dry fit the legs, this is also before I used a spokeshave to round the legs over, Spokeshaves are really satisfying to use.

After running a ½” round-over bit on the top edges it really started looking good.

Since I opted for a bean shape for the top I was behind everyone else in the class and then rushed the drilling of the legs. Some of the mortise and tenon joints were sloppy which was a bummer. You can sort of see the chipped wood on the top where I plunged the forstner bit through too fast.

In between sessions, I came up with a plan to address the sloppy mortise and tenon joints. I was going to gouge out a dimple that would go with the curvy bean shape. The results looked really cool, especially with soft natural light like in the photo below.

That big sapwood line was bugging me though!

Last, I domed the bottom of the legs to keep the curvy bean theme going. 

I coloured the bottom of the legs with a sharpie and knew if I could see some black on the bottom of the legs while rasping the dome shape the stool should be level.

Here it is final sanded, love the HCS studio for pictures.

And here it is finished with 2 coats of Osmo Clear. The top is cherry and the legs are red oak. The lighting in this picture on the stool is bad but I was really happy with the results. I meant to have that line of sap wood on the bottom but since I rushed the drilling for the legs I got it wrong, that’s my only regret on this piece, c’est la vie!