Office time

Whilst I wait on the skills of a much better photographer than myself I thought I would give you a quick preview of the office desks and shelves that I was working on in March.

There were six desks in total although only four are featured here. They were made to a simple but effective design from birch ply with the aforementioned walnut edge banding. The shelves in the end units are not fixed allowing them to be height adjustable. I sourced all the plywood and walnut edging from Thornbridge on Leith Walk who were really accommodating and helpful (rant to come on the not so helpful suppliers in this industry!). The desks were finished with Osmo polyx, a product I had not used before which was great for this scale of job and gave a really lovely and hard wearing finish. For impatient old me the only downside was the drying time. This job was a real learning experience in terms of scale and efficiency but I think it turned out ok in the end...

Iron on

I have to admit to being less than familiar with the iron. I'm a hang it over the radiator and the wrinkles will 'fall out' kind of girl.

This week however the iron and I have become better acquainted - in the workshop of all places. Yes, I discovered iron-on edge banding. I'm not quite sure how I missed this marvellous trick. My past edge banding experiences have involved me slavishly cutting strips of veneer,  applying glue (usually too much), then with frustrating slowness taping them section by section onto the edge to be covered. Iron-on however does exactly what it says on the tin. The strips of veneer or melamine are pre glued, the heat from the iron then activates the glue, a little pressure and hey presto a beautifully edged piece. Or so you'd think. It might just be me but I cannot say this process was without its own difficulties (any wise words, hints etc very welcome). The veneer still catches, moves, lifts, tears out and basically makes you want to hit it very hard with a mallet or in my case just cry. After some swearing I philosophically decided that, with edge banding, it is simply the nature of the beast and all you can do is take a deep breath and edge on!

Here are some photos of the lovely walnut edge banding I've been working with and the laying out and ironing on. (None of the trimming though, after my router experiences it might have been less than wise!)

Walnut edge banding (25mm)

Ironing it on...

The completed edge