Cufflink box

AndrewCr, member

15 users recommend

Cufflink case in American sweet gum burr

Andrew Crawford

boxwood protects all external edges

Andrew Crawford

the case has five drawers

Andrew Crawford

 ... to contain around 240 pairs of cufflinks

Andrew Crawford

the bookmatch around the figured maple escutcheon

Andrew Crawford

Cufflink case in American sweet gum burr

Photo: Andrew Crawford

Add Comment
Print

This is a large case, 20” x 14” x 14” intended for cufflinks. The main body of the box is made from oak and birch ply – it is veneered with spectacular American sweet gum burr featuring a four way bookmatch using the midway point of the front edge of the lid as the centre.French polished.

The lid and front are decorated with a wide figured maple line. The second image shows the way the line on the lid meets the simpler black and white lines at the sides and back and the boxwood that protects all the edges.

This case has five spring loaded drawers in oak. These are opened by lifting small turned ebony finials situated along the back edge of the interior. I have done many other cufflink boxes, but none the size of this or for as many pairs. Each of the five drawers is divided into 48 compartments thus catering for … 240 pairs in all. And then there’s plenty more space in the main box compartment above …

This was a difficult veneer to work with, but the gorgeous colour [similar to burr oak] and figure made it well worth the effort. You can see the wonderful shape created by bookmatching the spalted figuring just around the figured maple escutcheon. The bookmatch here, and on the lid, is a ‘perfect’ bookmatch. That means that they were each formed from two consecutive leaves from the same bundle, knife cut so no material has been removed between, and opened up. You can only do this with a pair of leaves, there is no such thing as a perfect four way book match as the figure will always have shifted.

Add Comment Print

A box fit for a future King & Queen.

Back to List

My Marquetry Creations

Comments (8)

EltonHammond writes: Truly spectacular, breathtaking work! I REALLY like it!
Posted: 10:06 pm on March 13th

andybarss writes: Really gorgeous, and impeccable design and execution. I have admired your work for quite a while -- I think you're one of the top three boxmakers in the world. I would love to see your work in person sometime (and would really love to take a workshop with you).
A question: how do you edge the panels, at least when you use MDF as a substrate? What I mean is that to have the MDF edge not show in e.g., the lip of a box, I would think it either has to be veneered itself, or be a solid bit of hardwood that is co-planar with the MDF panel.
Posted: 11:29 pm on December 14th

OmarAngelPerez writes: This is really beautiful Andrew!
Posted: 5:42 pm on September 17th

jj9ball writes: How much time did it take??? The last veneered box I tried took 2 months and didn't look nearly as perfect as yours. Great work.
Posted: 7:45 pm on September 13th

billbarrand writes: Hi Andrew,
Being a veneer guy myself I can appreciate the work.
Looks great,
Bill
Posted: 6:38 pm on September 13th

YOUNGNICK writes: Hi Andrew, another gorgeous box. I guess a guy can never have too many cufflinks, can he? I'm up to four pairs so far...
Posted: 2:12 pm on September 12th

AndrewCr writes: Hi, zbop - thanks for kind comment.

This box was commissioned for Guy Hands by his wife around the time he took over EMI, disastrously as it turned out. I have forever kicked myself that I didn't charge a great deal more than I did - he was the CEO of Terra Firma and was personally worth around £250M at the time!

I guess if you have that sort of money you have to spend it on something - why not cufflinks?!

Andrew.
Posted: 4:16 am on September 10th

zbop writes: Oh, come on! This is getting rediculous. The box is truly beautiful but who has that many cuff links.
Posted: 4:26 pm on September 9th

You must be logged in to post comments. Click here to login.