Thread: Simple jewellery box

When my wife told me that my twenties-something daughter was wanting a pearl pendant for her birthday yesterday, I thought that I might make a little presentation box to put the pendant in.

However, the idea grew and evolved to become a jewellery box made from some materials that I had bought from the recent Brisbane "Working with Wood" show.

Some might critique the box and say that it is just a plain machine dovetailed box. I, on the other hand, would describe it as having an "elegant simplicity".


Anyway, when I gave it to my daughter last night, she seemed to like it and immediately placed couple of new pieces of jewellery in it.


Timbers used were Tasmanian Blackwood for the sides and feature panel on the top. Huon Pine also on the top. The lining and tray are both cedar with felt covered ply bottoms.


Click for full size - Uploaded with plasq's Skitch


Click for full size - Uploaded with plasq's Skitch


Click for full size - Uploaded with plasq's Skitch


The feature panel in the lid sits in a rebate in the Huon pine frame. To get a perfect fit, I trimmed a piece of masonite in incremental steps to the exact size required to make a template from which I trimmed the blackwood to the exact size required using straight router bit with bearing on the router table.


I did face a bit of a challenge in machining the rounded corners in the feature panel to identically match the rebated round corners in the Huon pine. After unsuccessfully trying to see what combinations of router bit and bearing size and/or router guide might cut that radius, I took the easy way out and took a cast from one of the corners with plastibond and the resultant casting was then used with double-sided tape and a straight router bit with bearing to make perfect fitting corners on the masonite template on the router table.


Click for full size - Uploaded with plasq's Skitch

It may not be the most purist way of doing woodwork but it worked very well for me.


I am still early into my (late) entry into the woodworking hobby which I really enjoy doing and so I am still learning. For example. in using the patterned blackwood for the feature panel in the lid, I discovered how brittle it can be when I chipped an edge on the first attempt with the template on the router table.


Click for full size - Uploaded with plasq's Skitch


That meant that I had to redo the panel with a piece of the wood that was not as nice as the first piece but by taking it a lot slower the second time round, the job came out very nicely ...


Sanded down to 400 grit and finished with Organoil and daughter was very pleased with the outcome when she received it.


As I said, not a flash design but it has an "elegant simplicity." Certainly, I am pleased with the quality of my worksmanship in its construction.


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