DIY wood furniture

Most professional builders, like ordinary amateurs, prefer natural wood. Why is this happening? Anyone who can handle even a little homework and is familiar with wood will be able to produce some pieces of furniture from a timber or board. It can be an original bench for a summer residence, a table for a gazebo or even a dining set for your home. Natural materials are always better than artificial in their environmental characteristics, and they look more beautiful. To work with them, you only need to adhere to the generally accepted requirements for the manufacture of these items, and then make almost any furniture from wood with your own hands will not be difficult.

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Why is it better to use natural material?

If we consider the characteristics of natural wood, we can see that it has a number of own advantages:

• Beautiful view. Everything that is not made from this material looks very attractive and helps to create a cozy atmosphere in any home.
• Long service life. The tree is very durable, especially its species such as oak, beech and hornbeam. In addition, it is not afraid of mechanical damage and is resistant enough to them. Furniture made of natural wood can last up to 100 years.
• High ergonomics. From wood it is easy to make furniture that will take into account the tastes and characteristics of a particular person.
• Affordable production and repair. Repairing, as well as making wooden furniture with your own hands do not require any major financial investments with a competent approach.
• Natural material. Compared to plastic and other artificial materials, wood not only does not contain harmful chemicals, but rather fills the room with clean and healthy air.

Important! Some of its species secrete special substances that destroy harmful microbes.

• Variety of finishes. Furniture made by the hands of an experienced craftsman not only embodies his dream, but also has a very attractive look.
• Unrivaled exclusivity. Each piece of furniture made by hand has no analogues.

Each of those who would like to make furniture on their own has an excellent opportunity to realize all these advantages of wood in their products.

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Variety of wood materials

For the manufacture of wooden furniture, special panels are often used that are glued from thinner sheets or made from solid wood. They are great for the production of dressers, various cabinets and any other furniture items whose dimensions are quite large.

In addition, large-sized parts can also be prepared from such shields. Although many people use more exotic elements for their crafts, such as various boards, slabs, thin laths for sheathing and, of course, ordinary timber. Such a choice of material will only add unusualness to all furniture. As an example, you can point to the original garden benches made of timber.

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What types of wood can I use?

As a rule, wood is soft and hard.The following types of wood are soft:

• poplar and willow;
• pine and alder;
• cedar and spruce.

Hard rocks:

• elm and beech;
• oak and apple tree:
• plane tree and acacia.

Important! Of the soft wood species, various shelves, facades, and all those parts for which resistance to heavy loads are not the main factor are usually produced. Hard rocks - on the contrary, are used where high resistance to damage and heavy loads is needed.

More detailed characteristics of soft and hard wood will be considered below:

• Birch is a very soft material with a beautiful wood pattern, which is especially pronounced after special processing. Great for small pieces of furniture for interior decoration, such as small coffee tables, shelves and wooden decorative cornices.
• Pine is perhaps the most popular material for furniture because of its price. This is a soft tree, so it is recommended mainly for decoration. Well suited for the manufacture of various accessories, small cabinets and shelves.
• Willow is also a soft material from which small armchairs and chairs are made, as well as various tables. Products from willow always look very original, its positive energy completely fills the whole room. This material is very popular for the independent manufacture of garden furniture.
• Beech in its characteristics is very similar to oak, as it relates to hardwood. However, it is much inferior to oak in moisture resistance, therefore, it is mainly suitable only for furniture inside the house.
• Oak is a solid and very durable type of wood. Great for the manufacture of large cabinets and heavy chests of drawers, beds and dining sets, in general, all that require increased material strength and high resistance to mechanical damage. It practically does not rot and is not afraid of excess moisture. Oak furniture has been around for decades.

Important! When choosing a material, it is necessary to know its characteristics in advance. This is especially important if you decide to make wooden furniture with your own hands at home. For example, it will be useful to know that wicker chairs made of willow will subtly emphasize the interior design of your home and add coziness there. And the slats are useful for bringing small details into a single whole and help to elegantly decorate the interior. Such material as a croaker, if processed appropriately, will bring unusual elements of antiquity to the atmosphere.

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Wood selection

Before starting work, it is necessary to clearly understand that the furniture will serve for a long time if the material used for it was of high quality. The best option would be when control from cutting down trees to selling would be available. It is clear that this is hardly possible. However, there are many ways with which you can accurately determine the quality of wood:

• for quality work, only raw materials of the zero or first category are suitable;
• continuous drying of wood, carried out in accordance with all the rules, is the key to the durability of products;
• if the number of knots is small enough, then this indicates a high quality of wood;
• the board will be much stronger if the density of the rings on the tree is large enough, which is very important for coniferous material;
• if parallel rings are visible on the tree, then boards made of it will be distinguished by increased strength;
• for various combined small parts it is better to use rails, it is much more economical and cheaper.

Important! If you decide to combine several wood materials at once, then in this case it is necessary to take into account the structure of all different wood. Since, if it is too different, then it will also dry out unevenly. It is clear that manufactured furniture from such material will not be able to please you with excellent quality.This is especially important when children's furniture made of wood is on the agenda. The requirements for such furniture, as you know, are even higher. Therefore, you must understand in advance which texture you better choose. What is better suited for these purposes - smooth or matte surface? What kind of wood is linden, oak or maple? To get a deeper relief, it is recommended to use ash, oak, maple or walnut.

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Stages of manufacture

So, we are the stages of the production of wooden furniture with our own hands. In order to start this process, you will need tools, a working room and, of course, special technologies. The following is a phased list of most steps in the production cycle:

1. Discussion and approval of the project. It is necessary to immediately decide where the future furniture will be placed, what the material for its manufacture will be. Will it be a timber, slats or a slab, or maybe you would like to make it only from a solid oak massif? All your decisions should be reflected on paper.
2. Transfer the drawing directly to the material and its precise marking.
3. Cut the material, according to the marked markings.
4. Impregnation of wood with a special substance to protect it from the harmful effects of the environment, especially if you want to make garden furniture.
5. Stage of opening with colored or colorless varnish.
6. Direct assembly, when with the help of glue, slats and dowels, all individual furniture parts begin to join together.

These are the main steps showing how the manufacture of wooden furniture with your own hands occurs.

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We make beautiful antique furniture with our own hands

Antique furniture made of natural wood looks very nice. However, when making it, you need to take into account how your home is equipped, in other words, its existing style. For example, when you live in a house that was built in a classic style, such an idea will be very appropriate, but in modern High-tech or Vanguard - no.

For the manufacture of antique furniture you will need to fulfill the following conditions:

• furniture details should only be made of natural wood (the use of wooden plywood is allowed);
• to give a more ancient look to wood, special varnishes and impregnations are used;
• use fittings for decoration only artificially aged or truly old;
• be sure to use carving elements for your furniture, as it is simply organically suitable precisely for antique items of furniture interior, and all its fastenings to furniture are fixed using ordinary wood glue and do not take much time and effort.

The result of all this work will be wonderful antique furniture made of natural wood with your own hands. It will be truly unique, as it is made only in the singular.

Antique wood table

If you want to learn how to make furniture yourself, it is best to start with simple products. An ordinary table can be such a simple piece of furniture, since in order to make it, special knowledge is not required. To achieve acceptable quality, you will need to carefully grind its surface. For this work, you will need:

• good quality knot-free boards;
• a certain amount of timber;
• woodworking machine, if not, then a planer;
• powerful screwdriver;
• wood hacksaw;
• grinder with grinding wheels and sandpaper;
• screws with screws of various sizes;
• varnish and stain.

First prepare the boards for the front surface. To do this, it will be necessary to thoroughly plan and fit them in size. To avoid bulging the board, we carefully dry it beforehand, it is advisable to do this under the press. Under the size of the table we make a box of timber. And then all the steps go in the following order:

1. On the opposite side we fix the front surface to the finished box.
2. Then we make square legs from a wooden bar, which are better to carefully adjust, so that later your table does not stagger.
3. We fix the legs of the table in the corners of the box with the surface, for which we use prepared corners of metal.
4. All holes before installing the legs are filled with carpentry glue.

The work is almost finished, and you already have your own table, which was made with your own hands. It remains only to give it an antique look. In order to do this efficiently, it is necessary to have the surface of the table, including its legs, absolutely smooth. To do this, we use a special stain, which quickly ages our table. As soon as it dries, we will go around the table one more time with the smallest sandpaper. At the end of this work, you should get an original and antique texture.

Important! At the final stage, cover the table with a protective varnish. For these purposes, use colorless varnish. It is better to apply not with a brush, but with a swab in gauze. Do this procedure twice, after which your exclusive antique table will be completely ready.

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Stock footage

From this article, you learned some of the features of wood processing and its choice, so that the manufacture of furniture is successful. We hope you will not stop at assembling a table alone, but ennoble all rooms with practical and natural wood furniture!