Custom Corner Office Desk
Building a Custom Corner Office Desk
Ambrosia maple...you either love it, or you hate it. Fortunately, most people love it, and I love it too! That is why I was really excited for this particular project; a custom sized corner office desk made from ambrosia and soft maple. This desk was being built for my client, who is a retired engineer, so he had some very detailed specifications for the size and orientation of this desk given his office space. Once again, I had the opportunity to mix woods, which I love doing, with ambrosia maple, which made up the entire base of this office desk, and mix that with regular soft maple for the top.
Office Desk Design
Because of the size of the room this desk was going in, there were very specific size restrictions that I had to conform to in order to accommodate doors, floor registers, etc. Also, in order to get the desk into the office in which it was going, the desk had to be able to be taken apart to fit it through the hallway and door.
Armed with this information, I began to sketch out a few different design options. I knew we wanted a cabinet, or similar, on both the left and right side of the corner desk, but should they be open cabinets? Have drawers? We weren’t totally sure yet. Also, because this was going to be in a corner, I needed to have a support post in the back corner of the desk; this too would have to be able to be removed.
These are rough sketches showing the design concept and the overall size and orientation of the desk. On the left side of the desk, you can see an early concept for what we were thinking of doing for the left-side cabinet, but we ended up scrapping that layout and doing something else, but we had a plan in place.
The top of the desk was going to be solid maple and I was going to create/use a full-length mitered corner where the two sides of the top would intersect in the middle. It would have been easier to have one side of the top extend all the way to the end and then butt the other side of the top to it, but I think I just like to make things difficult for myself and I think this mitered corner would look better; provided I could pull it off!
Wood Selection
The base of this corner desk is made entirely of solid ambrosia maple wood. This meant I needed quite a bit of 4/4 for most of the base, and base trim, with some 8/4 to make up the four posts that I decided on for the right side cabinet. Here are some of the 4/4 ambrosia maple boards I was able to get; lot’s of ambrosia streaking in here!
The finished thickness of the maple top was to be 1 inch so I selected some nice and clear 5/4 pieces of soft maple. I also bought 12 foot long boards so I could use one length of board to make the left and right sides of the top; this would eliminate waste.
Milling Gluing and Building
So, the building of the base and top of the desk is pretty basic cabinet building, but there were a couple things to consider in this design. First, the entire piece is made from solid wood so wood movement must be considered. For example, with the left side desk cabinet, there are two solid panels that make up the front and back of the cabinet structure. I added a trim piece detail to the top and bottom of both the left and right cabinets, but on this left side, with the solid panels, this would mean the trim would be placed in a cross-grain situation as it relates to the panels. This could cause an issue if I glued, or nailed, that trim into place. As the seasons changed, it could cause the panels to crack. So, to accommodate this, the trim pieces on those sections were screwed in, from the back, with elongated holes. This should allow the panels to “breath” and the trim to remain in tact.
This wood movement is not an issue on the right side cabinet so all of the trim pieces there were simply glued into place.
To dress up the trim on these a little bit, I added a roundover to the bottom edge of the upper trim pieces and added a small ogee profile to the bottom trim pieces. All the corners were then also mitered.
The left and right side cabinets also received one adjustable shelf for the middle. The idea here was, books would most likely be placed in the left side cabinet and a printer and paper would be placed on the open, right side cabinet. The shelves could be adjusted to handle different printer sizes in the future, and different book sizes.
During the build, the client also decided to add a drawer to the right side of the desk. This was a bit of a challenge because that side of the desk is not very long so we had to be mindful of that. I built a simple, full-extension, drawer with an ambrosia maple drawer front on it.
Topping It Off
The top was, for the most part, pretty straight forward. I just needed to ensure that the entire top was good and flat and straight. Because the seam was going to be mitered together, making sure everything was flat and level was crucial or this seam would look terrible.
Because of the size of this top, it needed to be able to be taken apart in order to fit it down the hall and in the room. I used my track saw and a large 45 degree angle gauge to layout and cut the two halves of the top. Next, I need to align the top and lock it back together, but also be able to take it apart.
To do this, I used a Festool Domino to glue some dominos into one side of the top and cut corresponding mortises in the other side. These would align the left and right pieces together. To fasten the two sides together, I picked up some large table top knock down disks. I am pretty sure I got these from Lee Valley, but I do not think they make them anymore. These work by screwing a half-disk into each of the sides of the top. Then a large cap goes over these and you twist the cap and it locks the two sides together.
Finishing Touches
In order to enhance the natural character of the ambrosia maple, I chose to use Tried and True Danish oil on this piece. I simply rubbed on two coats with a rag, then buffed them out after several minutes.
After the finish cured, I wiped the whole piece down with 0000 steel wool and paste wax. This adds another layer of protection, but also creates a nice sheen and a buttery texture to the piece.
Conclusion
Although this project is fairly basic, there were a few distinct challenges for designing this corner desk. Knowing I had specific parameters (sizes) I need to fit in was great because it did help limiting the complexity of the design. It was challenging to engineer the entire desk to be taken apart, but also remain very solid, but I think I was able to achieve that, in part to the hefty weight of the top and its locking fasteners.
I hope you like this design and the look of the ambrosia maple. I’d love to see your feedback so feel free to leave a comment below. If you like these articles, please consider subscribing to blog post updates. Thank you!
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About Me…
Welcome to my blog. My name is Derik VanVleet and I am the owner/builder of VanVleet Woodworking llc. I hope you find this blog useful and insightful. Feel free to leave a comment in the bottom. Thank you!
