Mountain Table

This table was a fun project I took on when we needed a new dining table in my house. One of my roommates moved out, and the dining table was his, so we needed a new one! This was meant to be a table big enough to fit two people, as to not have it take up too much space in the kitchen. I originally was just going to slap together a table and call it a day, but I was looking at the piece of wood I had for the table top, and though it'd be cool to put a design on it. I was originally thinking of using tape, and just having the design unstained, but I decided to try something I'd never done - a metal inlay. I spent some time searching around on the internet, and eventually found a style I liked. I didn't make this design, but took inspiration from a few different designs. I like this one because it has a contrast between the natural shape of the mountain, and the geometric shape below. It is a cool juxtaposition of natural shapes with man-made shapes. 

The build was very simple, I freehand drew the mountains, then used a ruler and some approximate measuring to draw the reflection side. From then, I used a rotary tool with a router bit to carve out the channels. It ended up taking me a few days to do this, as I had to carve it out, then go back a few times to adjust the width. Once all the channels were cut out, I bent and set the aluminum in place, then used to wood glue to keep it in the channel. After gluing all of the aluminum in place, I used a belt sander to make the table top flush. This did cause problems, in that some of the aluminum dust was driven pretty deep into the wood, but it ended up adding some accenting that brought out the color of the aluminum. Lastly, I stained and sealed the wood, then painted the frame black (my roommate Eric built the frame out of 2x3's. This was a really tough, but fun project. I was able to get outside my comfort zone, and learn something new, which I enjoyed.