Gallery — The Custom Wood Studio

Curly Maple & Walnut Inlay Coffee Table

Furniture

Coffee table with a figured curly maple top framed by a walnut border, accented with geometric walnut inlay strips.

Mahogany Half-Lapped Lattice Table

Furniture

Client-inspired mahogany table. The top is built from half-lapped interlocking sections — an extremely time-consuming joinery exercise. The base is joined entirely with mortise and tenon.

Mahogany Lattice Table — Side View

Furniture

Distressed Walnut Kitchen Island Top

Kitchens

Walnut kitchen island top, 28" deep x 9' long, with subtle distressing throughout and a very low sheen protective clear coat.

Walnut Island Top — In the Shop

Workshop

Curly Cherry Hutch

Built-Ins

Natural curly cherry cabinetry — some of the nicest curly figure I've ever come across. Arched-top hutch with open display shelves above and a base cabinet with drawers and raised-panel doors.

Curly Cherry Built-In Cabinet

Built-Ins

Sycamore & African Mahogany Bookcase

Furniture

Bookcase designed with sycamore slab sides holding up African mahogany shelves. The shelves sit in a dado cut across the face of each live edge sycamore slab. 96" wide x 85" tall.

Live Edge High-Gloss Dining Table

Furniture

9' long x 48" wide dining table top made from two boards glued together with live edges on both outer sides. The clear coat is a highly durable multilayered finish that was sanded flat and polished back to a high-gloss sheen.

Naval Academy Nara Table Restoration

Restorations

Restoration of a 12' long table presented to the Naval Academy by the forest ministry of the Philippines in the 1950s. The top is a single massive piece of Nara with a Philippine ebony border. We removed the old shellac finish, replaced damaged wood, restored base inlay, and prepared it for a durable resprayed finish.

Naval Academy Table — Base Before Restoration

Restorations

Naval Academy Table — Inlay Repair Detail

Restorations

Walnut End Grain Butcher Block Island

Kitchens

3" thick walnut end grain butcher block top — what more is there to say.

Walnut Butcher Block — In the Shop

Workshop

Sapele Mahogany Waterfall Island Top

Kitchens

Figured Sapele mahogany kitchen island top with waterfall ends. 1 3/4" thick with one live edge and a low-sheen isocyanate urethane clear coat.

Sapele Waterfall — Corner Detail

Kitchens

Sapele Waterfall — Live Edge End

Kitchens

Sinker Cypress Kitchen — Island & Hood

Kitchens

Custom kitchen island and range hood made from sinker cypress and sinker pecky cypress recovered from underwater in Florida. Clear cypress for the framing, pecky for most of the panel detail, with a custom color to blend with the floor.

Pecky Cypress Range Hood

Kitchens

Sinker Cypress Kitchen — Front View

Kitchens

Walnut Cross-Section Veneer

Workshop

One incredible slice of veneer cut from a walnut tree, vacuum pressed onto MDF. Plan is to cut it out along the sapwood edge, veneer the edge, and hang it on the wall.

Walnut Veneer — Knot Detail

Workshop

Cherry Home Bar with Parquet Top

Built-Ins

Custom cherry home bar area with a solid cherry parquet top made from 150+ pieces. Finished with a dye, stain, and glaze combination for depth and aging, lightly distressed, and sealed with a post-catalyzed clear coat for durability.

Cherry Home Bar — Parquet Top

Built-Ins

Cherry Home Bar — Column & Corbel Detail

Built-Ins

Burl Walnut 3-Tier Side Table

Furniture

Three-tier side table with burl walnut top surfaces laid out in a four-way book-match, vertical-grain walnut edge banding, and a turned walnut column. Finished in a matte post-catalyzed conversion varnish.

Burl Walnut — Four-Way Book Match

Furniture

15' Sapele Mahogany Kitchen Island

Kitchens

15' long Sapele mahogany kitchen island top with a custom warm brown color and a low-sheen isocyanate urethane top coat. Includes an undermount sink cutout.

Sapele Island — Undermount Sink Detail

Kitchens

Sapele Island — Edge Detail

Kitchens

Cherry Library Bookcase with Rolling Ladder

Built-Ins

Custom cherry bookcase with painted base, 12' tall with a rolling ladder. All shelves are fixed in dadoes, and the upper cabinet has a beaded face frame with a dimmable LED light in the upper arch.

Cherry Bookcase — Room View

Built-Ins

Cherry Bookcase — Painted Base Detail

Built-Ins

Bow-Front Drawer — Veneer & Dovetail Detail

Furniture

Close-up of one drawer from a bow-front three-drawer cabinet. Mahogany box, white pine bow front, burl walnut veneer center, Holly stringing, vertical-grain walnut, and a solid walnut bead wrapping the drawer front — all with hand-cut dovetails. One of my favorite pieces.

Walnut Slab Theater Bar

Furniture

Home theater room bar top made from a single walnut slab with a low-sheen, durable clear coat.

Theater Bar — Long View

Furniture

Sapele Mahogany Conference Table

Furniture

Ribbon-striped Sapele mahogany conference table, 84" x 42", with custom-mixed dyes for a nearly natural color and a matte isocyanate urethane finish.

White Oak Mudroom Cabinets

Built-Ins

White oak mudroom cabinets with 9' tall doors built to look like three doors but open as one, with louvered upper panels and raised lower panels.

Mudroom — Corner with Bench

Built-Ins

End Grain Walnut Countertop

Kitchens

End grain walnut countertop sitting flush with the stone counter to the right. Finished with a food-safe oil finish and ready for cutting on.

Matumi Live-Edge Slab

Furniture

Live-edge Matumi slab table with walnut bowties, finished in a new ultra-durable very low-sheen clear coat for a natural look, set on a custom walnut trestle base.

Matumi Slab — Walnut Trestle Base

Furniture

Matumi Slab — Bowtie Detail

Furniture

American Cherry Island Top

Kitchens

American cherry kitchen countertop, 89" long x 58" deep, with a couple of rare 14"-wide boards. Finished with a super-durable low-sheen clear coat.

Cherry Island — Rounded End

Kitchens

Walnut Island with Inset Cutting Board

Kitchens

Walnut kitchen island top, 69" x 32", with a built-in removable end-grain walnut cutting board (oil finish). Top is finished in a permanent low-sheen clear coat.

Walnut Island — Installed

Kitchens

Zebrano End-Grain Island Top

Kitchens

End-grain Zebrano kitchen island top — stained and finished with a low-sheen clear coat. Zebrano is a unique striped hardwood from Africa.

Butcher Block Table with Metal Banding

Furniture

Custom hand-distressed metal banding with integrated towel bar applied to our end-grain butcher block table.

African Mahogany Kitchen Counter

Kitchens

Live-edge African mahogany kitchen counter alongside a black granite island.

Bubinga Office Desk

Furniture

My office desk made entirely from some of the best Bubinga out of Africa — 72" long x 36" deep, with live edges and a mirror-gloss finish.

Bubinga Desk — In Use

Furniture

Bubinga Desk — Full Top

Furniture

Walnut Entertainment Center

Built-Ins

Walnut entertainment center with floating shelves. The base is one continuous piece, 8' long, 22" deep on the sides and 24" deep at the bumped-out middle.

Bubinga Table Top — High Gloss

Furniture

Bubinga pieces finished with a high-gloss mirror finish.

Bubinga — Grain Detail

Furniture

Bubinga Pentagon Coffee Table

Furniture

Solid Walnut Exterior Door

Furniture

Solid walnut exterior door with true mortise-and-tenon joinery — 1" thick tenons mortised 1 1/2" into the stiles for an exceptionally strong door. Just out of the finish booth.

Floating Library Shelves

Built-Ins

New floating shelves with books, wrapping a corner with a rolling library ladder.

Cove-Front Maple Dresser

Furniture

Client-inspired reproduction in hard maple. Horizontal coves cut on the table saw, dyed with a bright amber undertone and topped with an espresso stain. Finished in a 2-part isocyanate urethane.

Burl Walnut Chest of Drawers

Furniture

All-walnut chest: burl walnut drawer fronts with vertical-grain walnut banding and holly stringing, crotch walnut book-matched top with vertical walnut banding. Mahogany drawer boxes with hand-cut dovetails. Assembled entirely with hide glue.

Walnut Chest & Mirror — Installed

Furniture

Burl Walnut Oval Mirror

Furniture

Reclaimed White Oak Crank Desk

Furniture

Reclaimed white oak desk top, 84" x 32", sprayed with an ultra-durable 4-sheen 'natural' finish that looks almost bare. Sits on an antique metal base with crank height adjust and tilt adjust.

Oak Crank Desk — Angled View

Furniture

Oak Crank Desk — Antique Base

Furniture

Zebrano Sink Base & Desk Top

Built-Ins

A sink-base top and a desk top, both made from Zebrano — a striking striped hardwood from the central part of West Africa (Cameroon, Congo, and Gabon). We don't get many requests for Zebrano, probably because of the cost — it's one of the more expensive woods.

Zebrano Vanity — Installed

Built-Ins

Zebrano — Grain Detail

Built-Ins

Vertical-Grain Walnut Kitchen

Kitchens

Walnut vertical-grain kitchen cabinets.

Pennsylvania Ave Kitchen — DC

Kitchens

Kitchen renovation on Pennsylvania Avenue, DC. We gutted the kitchen, opened up the wall a bit, and built all new cabinets — every drawer in solid walnut.

Penn Ave — Island & Hood

Kitchens

Penn Ave — Tall Cabinet Wall

Kitchens

Penn Ave — Walnut Drawer Detail

Kitchens

Penn Ave — Walnut Drawers

Kitchens

Radius-Mullion Vanity — Two Door

Furniture

Two vanities we just finished — every piece made in house. For the radius mullions we layered 1/16" straight-grain veneer with each layer laid opposite its mate, built several inside- and outside-radius templates, flush-trimmed every part, and made guides to run them through the moulder. The hardest part was blending the mullion into the inside bead of the frame. Finished in low-sheen extra-white conversion varnish, opening to walnut rollout trays. Hand-cut and shaped cabriole feet.

Diamond-Panel Vanity — Four Door

Furniture

Vanity — Walnut Rollout Detail

Furniture

Vanity — Walnut Drawer & Maker's Mark

Furniture

Walnut Bar-Height Counter — Grasonville, MD

Kitchens

Just installed another walnut wood kitchen top — this one at bar height. We mortised metal brackets into the underside and into the wall so they're not visible. The top is 10' long × 20" deep, finished in my favorite low-sheen durable finish. Grasonville, MD.

Vertical-Grain Walnut Dining Table

Furniture

A vertical-grain walnut dining table. The top measures 108" long × 39" deep × 2" thick. The base was client-inspired. Finished in a 2K isocyanate urethane, low sheen.

Cherry Library with Rolling Ladder

Built-Ins

Just got a photo from the client of our bookcase all loaded up. Really came out nice — cherry upper with a rolling library ladder, and painted raised-panel base cabinet below.

Walnut End-Grain Butcher Island

Kitchens

Finished and ready for delivery. The base is fabricated from hard maple in a beautiful black pigmented conversion varnish — smooth as glass, not a speck of orange peel. The 4" thick end-grain walnut top is oiled and ready for cutting. As you can see in the last shot of the base, we swapped the maple shelf for walnut — so glad we did.

Butcher Island — Drawer & Shelf Detail

Kitchens

Butcher Island — Workshop Reveal

Kitchens

Hand-Scraped Refrigerator Cabinet

Built-Ins

Solid Cherry Island Top

Kitchens

Philadelphia Tall-Case Clock — 1765

Restorations

Rift White Oak Kitchen & Island

Kitchens

Sinker Cypress Island — Pecky Door Detail

Kitchens

A kitchen island built from sinker cypress — cypress recovered from the bottom of a river. The door panels are pecky cypress, the framing is clear cypress, and the finish is a custom dye-and-stain combination developed for the client that ended up matching the floor almost exactly. More photos to follow once the stone and range hood are installed.

Sinker Cypress Island — End Panel

Kitchens

Bubinga Display Cabinets

Built-Ins

Pommelle Sapele Audio Cabinets

Built-Ins

Sapele Grain & Bead Detail

Built-Ins

US Naval Academy Carved Oak Lecterns

Built-Ins

Commissioned pair of hand-carved quartersawn white oak lecterns for the US Naval Academy, with carved eagles, acanthus, and scroll detailing framing inset engraved memorial panels.