Cari’s Picture frame

Well I’ve taken my sweet time with this project. About 2 years ago we got a print from the Dane County Cultural Affairs Commission and shortly thereafter I was commissioned to build a frame for it. I was told that she wanted the wood to be dark. So happily I went out and bought some Wenge for the frame. I got it home and put a swipe of varnish on it to really show it off to Cari. Her response … “Can you stain it to make it darker?” naturally I was taken surprise. Stain Wenge??? Are you out of your mind woman??? So I did what any reasonable woodworker would do. I went back to Woodcraft, I bought a board of poplar at 1/4 the price of the Wenge and some ebony dye stain. Not all is lost I still have the Wenge tucked in my shop awaiting the perfect project.

The construction was pretty straight forward. I used my miter sled on the tablesaw to cut the 45 deg angles and my router table to make the rabbet the glass/picture will sit in. I then made 2 mortises with my Festool domino in each 45 to reinforce the joint. It’s a fairly large frame 20″ by 36″ so with the back and the glass I figured that 2 dominos are better than one. Here are some pictures of my progress so far.