52 Weeks Of Carving - Week 1

So to develop my carving I'm trying to make sure I keep practicing little and often. I've set myself the challenge to carve or turn at least once a week. 

A mirror I carved for my wife for Christmas

This doesn't have to be for very long, and doesn't have to be a whole project completed, but ideally be more "craft" than more usual work, but if I manage to combine the two than that's even better (and add it to things I'm selling on Etsy).

Week 1 -

I have decided to make a new workbench for the workshop. Although I love my MFT style workbench (and I plan to make a Paulk Smart Bench fairly soon to add to this), I want a solid top workbench that I can use as a dedicated sharpening bench.

Layout

In my old workshop I had a good set up but that was nearly 10 years ago and I never got round to setting up anything the same in my new one, and as these things always are they move on and methods change and develop. 

I need somewhere I can easily store and set up my grinders, somewhere for my hundreds of sharpening stones and slips and somewhere to store carving chisels in rolls. I figure a 4ft workbench with drawers would be perfect for this. I purchased some 2" (50mm) thick beech for the top, but decided that there was no need to use that timber for the legs as I already had some large chunks of tulip/poplar that would be perfect. 

As it was tulip I decided that I should probably use it as a good excuse to practice a bit more carving. A simple repetitive design is really medative to work on.

So with the frame assembled and the top on the bench is far from finished but it is useable and I like the look of the legs.

When I make the drawers I plant to carve the drawer fronts, I have some lime that is wide enough so just need to decide on some patterns to carve out, this should provide lots of opportunity to get some more of my 52 weeks of carving in the bag!