Good Old (High) Boy

davidheim1

All,
Just finished modeling a trumpet-legged highboy in the William and Mary style. It's an iconic piece from early Colonial America (the original was made between 1690 and 1700) and has been reproduced by several present-day master furniture makers. The original is in the collection of the Brooklyn Museum, and the plan I used appears in "American Furniture Treasures," by Lester Margon.

Please have a look and let me know what you think.

Best,
dh

highboy.skp

Dave R

Very nice. Very nice. Excellent work.

You make it difficult to find those little things. I did find a few just to keep you on the straight and narrow.

highboy 1.png
Back left corner.

highboy 2.png
Lower case back needs to see a saw and chisel.

highboy 4.png
The second lock escutcheon is set into the drawer front deeper than its brothers. You could also remove the face skinning the key hole.

And a question. I noticed the corners of the base molding and the lower case top don't align. Is that the way the thing was designed? It looks like by adding 1/16-in. to the upper case depth (or subtracting it from the bottom), those corners would line up. Maybe it was designed so they don't?

Keep up the good work.

davidheim1

Dave,
I can always count on your eagle eye. Thanks.
(I can't believe I forgot to cut a bunch of dovetails.)
Gives me something to do later.
dh

john Msrk Power

Looks great! A lot of work went into this and I am impressed with the pulls. I am especially fond of highboys and it is nice to see one modeled. Good job!

Jean-Franco

Hi,
an excellent work indeed.
I notice something that should be adjusted.

Highboy correction.png

davidheim1

Good catch, Jean-Franco. It shows a minor shortcoming with the original plan. The front and part of the sides of the lower case have an applied molding along the bottom. The plan calls for the molding to be made from a 1-in. x 1/8-in. piece. But that molding interferes with the way the legs fit into the case. So for the purpose of the model, I decided to ignore the bad fit. If I were building the highboy for real, I'd add thin pieces around the blocks where the legs fit.

And thanks, John Msrk Power, for the nice words about the escutcheons. I modeled them after drop pulls offered by Horton Brasses. They were the closest I could find to the ones sketched in Margon's plan.

dh