Rift-Sawn Red Oak Wine Cabinet

sprague lake, estes park, colorado, 09.19.2004

Rift-Sawn Red Oak Wine Cabinet Susie and I had been talking about building a small wine cabinet for a while. Susie browsed through my new Woodsmith before I even got a chance to look at it. She brought my magazine to me in my home office and put this on my whiteboard's "woodworking to do" list before I even opened the cover. The plan called for Cherry and plywood for the cabinets. I love Cherry but didn't want to use plywood and instead wanted to try out my new Leigh D4 dovetail jig. I like the look rift-sawn red oak and decided to go with that. This plan was in Woodsmith 157 but you can also get it from plansnow.com.
Here are the glued up panels for the cabinet sides and the top.
I did a few test boards, then I got up enough courage to try it on my project. Here is the setup for cutting the tails.
The pins are on the top and bottoms of the cabinets.
Routing dovetails makes a lot of fine shavings.
I glued up the cabinets and was very happy with my first ever dovetails. They were a little proud but nothing a little sanding couldn't fix.
I used a 50/50 mixture of Varathane mission oak and cabernet stains to color the wine cabinet.
There were a lot of pieces to finish but it was easier to do before assembling.
I used Waterlox original sealer/finish for the topcoats. I was really happy with how the finish turned out.
Looks like we need to go buy some more wine now.