I often have the opportunity to work with designers and their clients, as they renovate or redecorate their homes. I’m always excited to learn about my clients’ interests and personalities as we create one-of-a-kind pieces that showcase who they are. This particular client was a food blogger who wanted a custom maple table to fit the whole family.
With the goal of seating all her grandkids, the client wanted a huge 12-foot centerpiece in her new Sundance Mountain cabin. Not only did the table have to be big and durable enough for family dinners, but it also had to be eye-catching enough to match a food-blogger-quality kitchen aesthetic.
Read on to learn about the process of creating a custom maple table for this food blogger’s Sundance Mountain cabin.
Designing a Maple Table Fit for a Food Blogger
For this client’s dining space, we wanted a lighter wood species to offset the dark cabinetry and complement the white marble kitchen counters. After going through tons of samples, we even made a site visit while the cabin was being built to make sure the slab wasn’t too orange or too dark in the space.
She wanted something with a ton of character and figure, and we talked about having a lot of open splitting for epoxy and metal bow ties to hold it together. According to WiseBond, bow ties are a great way to strengthen and stabilize cracks in wood slabs (while also creating an “aesthetically unique look”).
I showed the client both wood and metal ties, as well as a piece of the actual slab once it arrived. Ultimately, we decided on an incredibly beautiful Idaho Maple slab. A maple table would be heavy and durable enough to withstand any wear and tear from the client’s grandkids.
Maple Table Details & Challenges
A local arborist friend in Northern Idaho contacted me about a maple tree that had to come down because of disease. We ended up using it for the client’s maple table. After seeing the tree’s beauty, figure, and size (the client wanted a 12-foot table!), it was an easy decision to salvage the whole tree to give it a second life.
We went with a smoky epoxy for all the splitting and voids. To offset the lighter wood tones, we aged the steel bow ties to be a bit darker. Finally, because of the metal bow ties, the slab had to be surfaced flat, so we chiseled the ties into place by hand before pouring epoxy around them.
After several days of pouring epoxy, once the slab was completely set, it had to be hand scraped and brought back to perfectly flat. With a slab that size it took an entire day to continually scrape, hand plane and make sure it was level.
The two biggest challenges we faced with this project were placing bow ties and scraping epoxy. Once those were done, after a few coats of finish, this one-of-a-kind maple table was ready for its big reveal.
Revealing & Installing the Maple Table
This maple table was one of the most enjoyable projects and one of my favorite pieces I’ve ever made because of all the figure and character along with the incredible bow ties. Because it was delivered during the worst winter in Utah’s recent history, we had to time the delivery after the roads were cleared and the cabin was shoveled out.
We arrived after the roads were narrowly passable. We had to back down their road about a mile and a half. Unfortunately, the snow was too high to drive through, so we had to improvise by sliding the slab across the six-foot deep snow like a sled.
The client was so pleased with the end result and even sent us family photos at the table and featured us in her food blog! They were so excited to have their first family dinner and gather around their new centerpiece — where they’ll no doubt have family dinners for years to come.
Are you renovating or redecorating your home and looking for your own one-of-a-kind centerpiece? Contact me today to discuss options for your interior design project.
