We wanted a coffee table in the family room to replace the glass kidney shaped coffee table I’ve had for years for two reasons; I don’t allow feet on the glass table, and we want a place to store blankets and rarely used remotes. So I searched around the web for ideas and finally decided on a design that has a fold–down door facing the couch. Because the two small tables we have in the family room are light (maple and birch), we thought another light table would be too much, especially since this one will have a large presence. I’m sick of oak. Cherry is what we went with. One picture I saw had a glass door. The glass had vertical waves in it. I liked that look a lot. Hopefully I can find a glass place around here.

To see if we liked the design and size, I put the cardboard box that our new kitchen sink came in up on some VHS tapes, took a picture of it, then crudely Photoshopped it into a table.

The legs and main frame pieces all cut and tenons cut into the ends of the stretchers.

Mortising the legs. I set up jigs so they all came out exactly the same. Times like this it would be really nice to have a mortising deal on the drill press. It took me hours to chisel all 16 of them square and perfect after drilling them out.

Test fitting all the parts. The legs still need a slight angle cut off the two inner sides below the cabinet part.

The varnishing is finally done, so I glued it all up. After the glue dried, I shot some brads into all the corners from the inside, through the legs and into the tenons. I also used a little glue syringe to inject a small amount of silicone between the 1/4” plywood and the rails. This prevents the table from sounding cheap, because the panels don’t rattle if you knock on them. I hate that about factory made cabinet doors—you close them and they rattle.

This is the top. 3/4” cherry plywood with solid cherry edging half–lap jointed together.

And here’s the finished product. Finally. You can’t see the door in this picture, but I went with wood instead of glass. The opening would’ve been too short and looked wrong with only a thin strip of glass. The door is 3/4” cherry plywood with cherry veneer ironed onto the edges. That stuff is pretty slick. While you don’t have to worry about glue squeezing out onto the wood, there is a very thin layer of the hot–melt glue that can be seen from the side if you look very closely. Still, that’s much better than a big glue stain.

With the door installed.

Detail of an embedded magnet and the backstop with a little clear plastic (or maybe it’s silicone) bumper. This also reveals the place where I had to fill in a channel that wasn’t needed. When you think you’re done thinking about a project, think about it some more. I didn’t fill the slot in the top stretcher because it won’t be seen unless you happen to be laying on the floor and open the door. And yeah, no veneer on the bottom edge of the door. I don’t care.