Classic Cherry Chest

Whether you use this moderately sized chest for storing bedding, photo albums and other keepsakes or off-season clothing, it’s also just the right height to serve as a quick seat for putting on your slippers or shoes. I think every woodworker should eventually build a Shaker-inspired chest like this, because it’s one of those enduring woodworking classics. It also provides a good opportunity to practice your dovetailing skills. If you haven’t built a chest like this before, here’s your chance to give one a go!

Starting Out with Dovetails

Let’s get this project underway by gluing up panels for the chest’s front, back and sides. Flatten their glue seams by scraping or hand-planing, sand the panels up to 120-grit and then cut them to final size, making sure their ends are square. Mark the outside “show” faces on the panels, and label the corner joints to keep their orientation clear.

The next step is to cut through dovetail joints to bring the chest panels together. You could cut these with a router and dovetail jig, which is a perfectly acceptable option. But for this project, I wanted to make narrower pins than my dovetail jig will allow. I also wanted the freedom to space the pattern as I liked, so I decided to cut them by hand instead.

If you like the look of my pin and tail pattern (see the on page 43), lay out the tails on the front panel. Start by scribing a baseline for the tails all the way around both ends of the panel with a marking gauge. Set these scribe lines about 1/32" deeper than the thickness of the side panels (this way, the tails will protrude ever so slightly when the joints are assembled so you can trim or sand them perfectly