JJ Boudreau Woodcraft
2353 Cornwall Rd. B0J 2E0 Mahone Bay, NS, Canada

Pretty proud of this one! A recently completed midcentury Danish style desk. The walnut drawer boxes are suspended from ash legs. Fitted with solid ash drawers and faced with bookmatched walnut crotch wood and baked curly maple pulls. I put a fresh chamfer on the edges of the desktop and refinished It with OSMO Polyx hardwax but can't take credit for its construction. It had been for sale as a countertop in the Windhorse farm office for years..it finally has a good home. #danishfurniture #woodworking #osmopolyxoil #finefurniture #walnutdesk #lunenburgcounty #southshorenovascotia

This was a fun project! A customer needed a way to keep his thirty+ hats off the floor. I originally thought I'd do something more straight forward with store bought hooks for hanging the hats but realized that many hats would eat up alot of wall space.. unless I could cram them into a smaller area. I wanted to do something kind of sculptural and imagined a giant spinal column. I had to tweak the 'vertebrae' so that they'd squish each hat in a way that kept them horizontal in...stead of just hanging brim down. In the end it doesn't look as much like a spine as I'd hoped but now I see a few other things in it, like an antelope skull at the very bottom and a mastadon head at the top. Woods used are some local antique butternut for the frame, local black locust for the backing panel and roasted maple which originally came from the Medway Community Forest. Im waiting on some photos of it mounted and loaded with hats. Will update when I get em!

I recently had the privelege of designing, building and installing this massive (6'x8') 'barn door' for the Town of Bridgewater. In the last few months I haven't done alot of jobs that gave me complete artistic freedom and had a decent sized budget to accomodate some extra special woods. This job was a great opportunity to do just that and I'm quite happy with the results. The bulk of the door is made up of sugar maple, each plank routed with a v-groove t&g profile for a ni...ce effect. The medieval timber inspired frame is made from some beautiful cherry , which, although it can be a bit hard to work with sometimes has become one of my favorites for it's totally unique grain and color variation. The little detail at the top corners of the door where the vertical pieces meet the top rail has become a bit of a signature of mine. Its inspired by a timber framing joint called an eased haunch. It has no real structural use in this application (especially since it's not in the right orientation) but in timber framing allows you to rest the whole width of a beam into a mortised post instead of all of the weight coming down on just the 2" thick tenon.

When i started wood working, I really wanted to stay away from using toxic stains and clearcoats, knowing the kind of damage they do to the body and environment. It is truly startling how noxious the off-gassing of most oil based stains and other finishes is. Initially, I did quite well and used only benign vegetable oil based finishes that did the job of bringing the natural beauty of the wood out and allowed me to breathe comfortably in the shop without a respirator and ex...haust fans going constantly. But as time went on durability became a priority for things like table tops and counters and I eventually became a stickler for a built up patina that only those noxious finishes seem to offer. I still loved the look of woods with natural oil finishes but I needed to have confidence that my work would hold up in customers houses under wet conditions without routine maintenance. Though the petroleum based products do a great job in achieving a fine finish at a reasonably low price point, im finally convinced that it is just no longer worth the tedium and the awful effects it has on my health. I do my best to wear my respirator and gloves when I use these finishes but there are inevitably times when i cant find my mask and need to throw a quick coat on a stick or two of wood. Exhausting the fumes or working outside isnt an option in the colder months and there's always something left off-gassing in the shop when finishing is over and im still in there working on other projects. I also come home reeking of fumes, feeling brain damaged and have this general feeling of being contaminated. So, the point of this drawn out post is that I am back to using the natural options almost exclusively with the exception of projects that see alot of abuse or weather. I hate stain anyway but what stain i do use will be waterbased and contain low VOCs. Im done poisoning myself and the environment with the fumes and toxic garbage generated in the application of these products when there are safer albeit more expensive options out there.

All but one tread are in! Just need to now build the 2nd floor in to reflect the circle of the stair. Life is good. #spiralstair #woodworking #naturalbuilding #livewood

Ill just let this soft bed of wood shavings pile up for when this beast of a drill inevitably jams and tosses me from great heights. (Jus kideng!) #spiralstair #naturalbuilding #logcirclestair #woodworking #woodwork

The things you can do with a roll of 5000 free stickers.

The MothMill Prophecies