I've Never Made a Perfect Box

But, I have made a few beautiful ones

I’ve been excited to make this chopstick storage box for my kitchen and share the process with you. So far, I’ve been talking about the importance of choosing lumber with grain that bolsters the design’s inherent beauty, and how to mill and cut that board to get the best possible grain wrap around all four corners. After resawing to create the two thin boards I’d used to make the box sides, I cut the sides to length. This week, I went into the shop and cut the miters and rabbets for the bottom and lid. I then lined the sides up on my bench and then realized I had made a colossal mistake, one that pretty much ruined everything that I had stressed about selecting materials, milling, and resawing. So, instead of showing you a picture of each corner with the grain wrapping seamlessly around all of them, I’m going to show you all four corners and explain what I did wrong, as well as how all the things I did correctly help save the box.

Tomorrow, I’ll get back to work on the box. In the end, it will be beautiful, and I won’t beat myself up about it anymore after I send this post out into the world.