Developing our new range of artisan, solid wood and veneered parquetry/marquetry, double and single ring boxes. This week we have been busy developing a new range of luxury wooden ring boxes, with hand cut parquetry (geometric/ pattern marquetry) designs. The reason for designing this new range of wedding day and engagement ring boxes is that we want to give our customers more choice, so that they can find the perfect box that matches their individual needs. We are currently fully immersed in the prototyping stage, looking at the combination of natural and coloured veneers we can use, our favourite patterns to develop further, the optimum size of the boxes and the very important smallest details that combine together to make a perfect finished product, ready to produce a small finished batch of single and double artisan ring boxes to photograph and add to our website as soon as we can.
We will continue to develop our ideas over the next few weeks, working towards our final boxes which will be launched on our website as soon as we can. Like anything worth waiting for, the process from producing initial sketches, to the CAD design development stage and then onto prototyping in order to produce a fully completed ring box is a lengthy, but also a very enjoyable and satisfying process for any true designer/maker. We believe that these luxury wedding and engagement ring boxes will fit the 'big day' perfectly, as two rings can be presented side by side in a unique and stylish, hand-crafted way, for use on this very special occasion.
What is veneering, marquetry and parquetry?
Veneering dates back to the ancient Egyptians who used expensive and rare wood veneers over cheaper timbers to produce their furniture and sarcophagi; the Romans also used veneers in mass quantities. A veneer is simply a thin slice of wood, usually thinner than 3mm, that is glued onto a core solid or processed wood, to produce flat panels. Today veneered panels are used extensively in the furniture industry on everyday products such as doors, tops, kitchens, parquet floors etc. Cabinet makers who make finer furniture also use veneered wood, marquetry/ parquetry, where veneers are cut and glued together as images or patterns. It can be a bit confusing but technically marquetry refers to veneered images and parquetry is the correct term for veneered patterns, but the name marquetry is often used as the general term for both. You can see the use of this technique on pieces of antique furniture which often has ornate, marquetry panels, used to decorate a cabinet top or face.
Although our contemporary designs are not as complex as marquetry panels produced in the past, even making a simple parquetry pattern does require patience, knowledge and precision to individually cut and apply each piece to the solid box lid, so that it forms a seamless part of the construction. These practical skills have been honed through the making of fine bespoke furniture over many years. Below are some photos showing the making of our 'Louis cube' designs.
How does Cubi boxes use veneers and marquetry?
Our ring boxes use veneers in three different ways; in the construction of the layers of birch plywood (plywood consists of three or more layers of veneer, glued with its grain at right angles to adjacent layers for strength), which our geometric ring boxes are made from; to decorate the faces of our ring boxes, adding a layer of natural or vibrant colour, and in the marquetry panels made for the tops of our range of beautiful solid double ring boxes. Our favourite veneers are tulipwood, rosewood, pear, cherry, smoked oak, elm, walnut, wedge and koto. All these natural and coloured veneer combinations work well together - coastal blues, garden greens, natural woods with subtle or vibrant shades; but making the perfect choice for each design range is not easy.
How are veneers made?
Veneers are made by either 'peeling' the trunk of a tree or by slicing large rectangular blocks of wood known as flitches. The appearance of the grain and figure in wood comes from slicing through the growth rings of a tree and depends on the angle at which the wood is cut. There are three main types of equipment used to make veneers -
a rotary lathe turns the wood against a very sharp blade and peels off one continuous or semi-continuous veneer as a roll. Rotary-cut veneer is mainly used for plywood, as the veneer is concentric to the growth rings. Veneers cut using a slicing machine where the log is raised and lowered against the blade and slices taken. This veneer looks like sawn pieces of wood, cut across the growth rings and is known as 'crown cut'; and a half-round lathe in which the log can be turned and moved to expose the most interesting parts of the grain, creating a more textured feel and appearance, known as 'rift cut'. Each slicing process gives a very distinctive type of grain, depending on the tree species. We love the different, individual grain patterns and textures that each wood veneer has.
Why use wood and wood veneers?
Apart from being an aesthetically beautiful and a very tactile material, solid and veneered wood is a natural, sustainable, regularly renewable resource which is also recyclable, biodegradable, energy- efficient and non-toxic. The natural growth cycle is a key element in reducing CO₂ from within the atmosphere, helping to mitigate the 'greenhouse' effect and the ozone depletion. During the manufacturing process very little wood is wasted, sometimes only the saw blade thickness, known as the 'kerf' or none at all if a knife is used, like the natural veneers on our boxes, which at 0.6mm thickness is cut very thinly using this method.
Why are trees so important to our environment and our economy?
Trees have numerous environmental and economic benefits, including:
1 tree absorbs around 1 tonne of carbon during its lifetime making it one of the cheapest, most cost-effective means of reducing carbon.
1 tree produces enough oxygen each year to support 2 people.
Trees provide a wonderfully rich habitat for all sorts of wildlife, greatly improving biodiversity.
Trees improve health and wellbeing by purifying contaminated water and removing harmful pollutants from the air
All photos taken in our workshop during the development of our new range of Cubi single and double ring solid walnut hardwood and marquetry top boxes.
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