Working with multiple materials, I decided to use materials I haven’t tried so far — bookends made with wood and cardboard decor.
The basics are 2 L-shape structures, doweling pins will connect the vertical and horizontal wooden panels. The surfaces of vertical panel are where the decoration/other materials will be.
I started with a 12×12 MDF:
Using band saw to create verticals…. Ben was right, band saw is not for precision cut.
Had to fix it:
Then I tried miter to create horizontals, still not perfect, but much better, clean cuts.
I used dowel pins to connect the two pieces, and hand drew the star-tree on cardboard as decoration base, which sits on the surface of vertical panel. Tissue paper will be used to wrap the tree.
Final result:
Afterthoughts:
- The finish — the color of the MDF wood is not flattering, and it scrapes easily. Apply finishing wax should help protection and polish.
- Execution is as important as planning. I never expect to get stuck wrapping the star trees. The attempt was unsuccessful, so I opted to just cut the tissue paper into shape of tree instead.
With two weeks to work on this project, I would have hoped for more of a finish to this project. A coat of paint or some other type of finish would have really dressed up the bookends. Also, the sizes seem to be very different from bookend to bookend. Was that intentional?
I would have liked to see more process shots in your documentation. Did you glue the MDF pieces together as well as dowel pin them? How did you affix the paper to the start trees? How did you affix the star trees to the MDF “L’s”?
I liked some of your sketches in the first photo. Why did you abandon the brass? Or the other shapes you drew?