Lutyens Garden Bench

**Squirrel** · 25th October 2009, 10:53 PM

I made this bench for the kids to sit on to put on their school shoes, started to feel a bit guilty watching them sit on the cold concrete to do this.

I found an old FWW mag that had a brief description to build a Lutyens Garden Bench. I had a stack of old Oregon rescued from the neighbours pergola reno. Don't know if this would be the right timber for this project or how long it will survive outdoors. It will be under cover but exposed to the weather.

Attached are photos of my initial build:

Photo one depicts the general condition of the oregon prior to being dressed a little or should I say a lot.
Photo two is of the back which had to be in two halves made with a template and joined with a floating tenon.
Photo three are of the front and back legs.
Photo four is the start of the chair assembly, needed to do this to get the measurements of all the filler pieces. The magazine didn't have a full dimensional drawing to go off.

Will post more pictures tomorrow with final assembly.

Squirrel.

**ajw** · 26th October 2009, 07:51 AM

That's going to be one impressive bench. Looking forward to more pics of your progress.

ajw

**Sandow** · 26th October 2009, 05:06 PM

wow, very nice. i love the shape of the back

**Squirrel** · 26th October 2009, 06:29 PM

Thanks for the comments guys...

Has been a bit of a learning curve for me, as I said in my original post, the magazine had only minimal measurements and descriptions. What I should have done was to do a full set of drawings of the bench for myself. Some of the measurements given in the magazine were actually wrong and silly me just followed them without double checking.

As can be seen in the last photo in the first post the bottom support rail ended up being a little short. Rather than cutting a new one I decided to shorten the two other rails to make it all fit. This was also done so I could re-cut the join in the main back pieces. This created other follow-on misdemeanors that I wont bore you with.

The glue up took some thought and was a major operation in it's self. Every joint was either a mortise and tenon or a dowel joint. Even the back slates were M&T or doweled.

I'm pretty happy with the end result, and amazed how well a little wood filler makes a bad joint look good.

Currently given it a coat of exterior Jarrah stain. May have to give it a second coat as a darker finish is preferred. After the stain has dried I plan on giving it a wipe with citrus oil.

Attached are the photo's of the finished seat.

Squirrel.

**artme** · 26th October 2009, 10:35 PM

VEry smart unit, Squirrel. Invites use.

**Expat** · 26th October 2009, 10:40 PM

That is one nice bench mate.

**Sandow** · 27th October 2009, 05:12 PM

What a beauty, i thought the better of showing it to my wife, she'd end up wanting one..

**Squirrel** · 27th October 2009, 11:05 PM

Thanks for the comments, my wife thinks that I will need to either chain or bolt it down on the front veranda. She is saying that it will disappear in the first week.

Might put a small angle bracket on the back legs and dyna bolt it to the concrete.

Squirrel

**opelblues** · 27th October 2009, 11:51 PM

what size dyna bolt so i can bring the right spanner

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