FOR the man who likes to make things, few pleasures compare with building fine pieces of furniture in a well-equipped home workshop. The cabinet woods in themselves are beautiful and pleasant to work with; the crisp cutting action of plane and saw have a music all their own; and every stage of the work, from jotting down the cutting list to the last stroke of the polishing cloth, is of utmost interest.

Fig. 1. - This type of table, originally used in taverns, is highly prized by collectors of American antiques.

The problems involved in cabinet work, such as laying out and making joints, are less difficult than commonly believed. Many of the processes the amateur woodworker is likely to encounter are discussed in following chapters, but there is nothing in the technic of woodworking which cannot readily be mastered. Where beginners are apt to fail is in selecting designs. It is no more difficult and, indeed, often easier, to make a well-designed piece of furniture than something that is clumsy and unsightly.

In this chapter designs will be given for constructing reproductions of several Colonial pieces of noteworthy design and for making some modern pieces which are especially adapted for the amateur cabinetmaker who has to rely mainly, if not entirely, upon hand tools. Of course, if small woodworking machinery is available, the same methods outlined in Chapter V (Small Woodworking Machinery) can be used for making the pieces of furniture illustrated and described in this chapter.