Mission Cabinet

Here's a custom cabinet designed to fulfill a specific need. My wife's china collection requires photographs for documentary and resale auction purposes. I built this Mission style cabinet to double as an easel for photographing china pieces and as storage for supplies.

Studio Model

Home Model

You can build one just like it for your own purpose...if you like Mission style.

Plans

Build your own Mission Cabinet from my PDF plans document. They're free!

GET THE PLANS! 

Before and After

Here's what wifey was using. Pathetic, no? To the right was a small table for her printer and whatnot I hacked together years ago before I had a shop and good tools. That old table got replaced as well.

The replacement cabinet had to have certain things:

Today - So here's how the cabinet looks in place, with the matching table.

Plan B - Use Sketchup

This is the first time I've started a project by actually creating detailed scale drawings.

Using Sketchup 7 was the smartest thing I could have done. Saved oodles of mistakes by making them on the drawing board first and fixing them there instead of in the shop.

The details are complete, even down to the mortises, tenons, and apron cleats to support the bottom.

For my own use, I also created dimensioned components, which are hidden in the project as shown left.

Having started this way I won't go back. "Building" it on paper got me so comfortable with Sketchup that switching between tools and views with hotkeys is now automatic

I am indebted to Rob Cameron for his Sketchup For Woodworkers tutorials. Excellent detail and a thorough job.

Wood Selection

Since it would have to match the other furniture I made for her room, I went with solid maple for the legs and drawer front, and maple plywood for the top and sides.

Mortise & Tenon Joinery

First I routed the mortises with a jig I built from an idea inspired by Shopnotes mag. Building it consumed a couple of days in the shop with no progress on the cabinet, but the jig was worth doing. I LOVE this thing!

Once the leg mortises were routed, I squared the mortise ends with chisels and then trimmed the tenons to fit, using a new purchase from Lee Valley. All the gurus say no shop is complete without a shoulder plane, and I agree.

Here is the first trial fit after hogging out the mortises and fitting the tenons.

Side Panel Cutting and Assembly

The 3/4" ply sides are thicker than I needed, but I already had the stuff and couldn't see buying a whole sheet of half-inch.

Taper Jig

Only the outside edges of the legs are tapered, but I needed a jig for the job anyway, so I made my own from MDF, easy-peasy. Just drew a line from the wide foot corner a few inches from one end of the MDF to the narrower top corner at the other end. Cut it using the saber saw running against a clamped guide piece. (Below right, the jig in action.)

Top Crosspiece

Tying the side panels together at the top is a dovetailed maple crosspiece with a haunched tenon to hold the front together and create a top frame reference for the drawer.

Drawer & Door

Drawer box is red oak with hard maple front, box joints for solid integrity. The handles were selected to match the other furniture in the room.

Plenty of storage below. Pivot hinges keep clean lines, smooth operation with no marks on inner leg surface.

Finishing

The finish is one coat BLO to bring out the figure, one coat Zinsser dewaxed shellac to fill, and two coats Varathane clear satin applied with a folded paper shop towel. Sanded with 320 grit between coats.

Conclusion

The new cabinet turned out pretty nice, and I think the table is a good match.

Thanks for looking, and I hope you enjoyed your visit.