A friend came to me for help with an idea that he wanted to present to his wife for an anniversary gift. He mentioned that he wanted to build a table/wine rack out of a wine barrel that they had purchased together when they got married. I had never worked with anything "reclaimed" before; let alone the arched shape of the staves, the curves of the inside of the barrel. When I cut the bands off, and used my Ryobi jigsaw to open the barrel up, I was surprised to discover that the barrel was charred inside rather than having the burgundy stain I was expecting. This was overcome by using a blowtorch to slightly char all of the white oak that I had exposed on the edges of the staves and on the top which I had made from store bought white oak. The most difficult part of the project was getting the staves cut just right for the wine rack portion of the barrel. I really had to "sneak up" on them to match the curved, arched shape. Being my first project of this sort, I was quite critical and a little nervous, but everybody loved it. My friend and his wife have had several people make offers for it, but obviously the barrel means way more to them because of its history.
A friend came to me for help with an idea that he wanted to present to his wife for an anniversary gift. He mentioned that he wanted to build a table/wine rack out of a wine barrel that they had purchased together when they got married. I had never worked with anything "reclaimed" before; let alone the arched shape of the staves, the curves of the inside of the barrel. When I cut the bands off, and used my Ryobi jigsaw to open the barrel up, I was surprised to discover that the barrel was charred inside rather than having the burgundy stain I was expecting. This was overcome by using a blowtorch to slightly char all of the white oak that I had exposed on the edges of the staves and on the top which I had made from store bought white oak. The most difficult part of the project was getting the staves cut just right for the wine rack portion of the barrel. I really had to "sneak up" on them to match the curved, arched shape. Being my first project of this sort, I was quite critical and a little nervous, but everybody loved it. My friend and his wife have had several people make offers for it, but obviously the barrel means way more to them because of its history.
