Category Archives: How-to

Guides to building props or using certain techniques and materials

Art Deco Liquor Cabinet

The set for Triad Stage’s And Then There Were None called for a posh, but stark, Art Deco design. One of the key furniture pieces is a liquor cabinet, since each of the ten characters has at least three drinks through the course of the play.

I had no luck sourcing an Art Deco liquor cabinet in this part of the country, so I decided to build it. Having a very distinctly Deco piece on stage would help the other less-distinctly Deco pieces feel at home in the period. Robin Vest (the scenic designer), and I passed around some research images and landed on a piece that had all the right elements but was still achievable with my equipment and time.

Making the cuts
Making the cuts

One defining element for this style of furniture is the bold, sweeping curves. These were traditionally made by bending thin sheets of wood and laminating them together to create a curved piece of plywood, then adding a highly-figured veneer on top. That was beyond my budget, but I had previously bent plywood by cutting kerfs, and thought I could do it again. The design of the cabinet was specifically chosen to easily hide the kerf cuts.

I chose some nice maple plywood from the big box store. The back of the cabinet and the doors would establish the curves, so I taped them together when gang-cutting them on the band saw.

Assembling the carcass
Assembling the carcass

When all the flat, fixed pieces were cut, I assembled it together without glue to make sure everything was measured correctly. The cabinet was basically two parts with a door on each side.

Cutting the kerfs
Cutting the kerfs

To cut the kerfs, I first measured where the curve would begin and where, roughly, it would end. I left the piece a bit long, intending to trim it to the exact size once the kerfs were all cut. You can never calculate exactly how long a piece should be when you add a curve to it; the material behaves differently than how the math predicts.

I set the blade height on the table saw so it would cut through all but the last layer of ply on my plywood. I used a sled to cross cut the groove through the length of the wood. I had a marking on the table saw so that after each cut, I could slide the wood down to make the next cut, and each cut would be evenly spaced.

I’m sure there is some formula to calculate how far apart each cut should be, but I just used a test piece of wood to make sure I was achieving the curve I needed.

Attaching the curved pieces
Attaching the curved pieces

When all the kerfs were cut, I was ready to attach the bent pieces to the frame. They were glued to the back of the cabinet, while the front would be open for the doors. I clamped the doors in place so the plywood was held in the correct shape while the glue dried.

While everything was still clamped, I filled the kerf cuts with a mix of sawdust and wood glue to sort of “lock” it in place. A curved piece of wood like this can move if it is not fully supported.

The cabinet body
The cabinet body

The curved pieces were a bit springy without any front supports, so I added an oak frame. It was inset so the doors would still be flush with the front when mounted; it also helped serve as a door jamb to prevent the doors from swinging inside.

Stained and shellacked
Stained and shellacked

I stained the outside of the cabinet with one coat of English Chestnut stain. All the plywood edges were sanded smooth and filled, then painted black. The curved edges needed a lot of filling to close the gaps from the kerfs. Everything then got two coats of amber shellac, sanded down with some #000 steel wool after each coat.

Painted interior
Painted interior

For the sides of the interior, I laid in some thick mirrored mylar I had left over from another project. A lot of liquor cabinets in this style had mirrored interiors. It also allowed me to cover the kerfs on the inside of the curves, which would have taken forever to sand smooth. The remaining interior surfaces were painted with some bright yellow I had gotten for another 1930s-inspired piece.

I also added some molding to the bottom and two more panels to the top to create the stepped design that is another characteristic of this style.

Art Deco Cabinet
Art Deco Cabinet

After mounting the doors, the final step was adding the handles. I cut and shaped some basic handles out of a piece of two-by-four. I added them after the doors were mounted because they all needed to line up visually with each other, even if the doors were not precisely straight and even.

Cabinet front view
Cabinet front view

I was very proud of this piece. Even though its flaws and theatrical construction were apparent up close, it looked stunning from only a few feet away.

Art Deco Sconces

We recently opened “And Then There Were None” at Triad Stage in Greensboro, NC. Agatha Christie’s classic murder mystery takes place in 1930’s England in a sleek, unique seaside home. Robin Vest’s scenic design gave us a sparse, Art Deco-inspired interior populated with a few trappings of a world traveler.

Flanking the fireplace were two tube sconces. Finding an appropriate vintage pair was proving to be too expensive, so I decided to make them.

Turning the End Caps
Turning the End Caps

I turned the top and bottom caps out of poplar on my lathe. I think this was the first project I personally used the shop’s lathe for, even though I purchased it last year.

I bought some plastic mailing tubes for the lamp shades. Glass tubes were pricey and difficult to find in the right size. I measured their inner and outer diameter and turned the end caps so the tubes would slide onto them snugly.

Cutting lamp parts for the arms
Cutting lamp parts for the arms

I needed some curved metal arms to hold the end caps, and they needed to be hollow so I could feed the wires through. I had some spare chandelier arms in my bin of lamp parts which I cut to size. It was a lot easier than attempting to bend a metal tube without kinking it.

Unpainted assembly
Unpainted assembly

Above is all the pieces mostly assembled. I drilled holes in the end caps to feed the metal arms in, and used epoxy clay to secure them. I cut a disc out of poplar for the wall plate and drilled two more holes to hold the metal arms. The bottom arm was epoxied in place, but the top arm was only bolted to the plate. I wanted to be able to disassemble the sconce in case I needed access to the interior of the tube.

I added a decorative disc of metal to the wall plates that also came from my lamp parts bin, which you can see in subsequent photos.

Base coat
Base coat

With all the pieces fitting together as they should, and sanded smooth, I took them apart and painted them. I used a variety of spray cans. First was a sandable primer, followed by two coats of gloss black, than two very light coats of chrome, finished off with an extremely light dusting of the gloss black again. I only waited about half an hour between coats, so the whole process was finished in a morning. If you wait too long between coats, the paint may develop that dreaded “orange peel” appearance.

Adding the LED tape
Adding the LED tape

Because the tubes were plastic, I could not use any incandescent or halogen bulbs. The heat would build up and melt everything. I bought some warm white LED tape and mounted it to a small stick of wood to hold it straight against the back of the tube. The wires ran through the arms and out the back to a transformer and DMX controller, where it could hook up to the theater’s light board.

I cut a piece of thick vellum to line the inside of the tube and provide some diffusion.

Finished sconces
Finished sconces

Here they are, fully assembled and ready to go. Even though these LEDs were the warmest white I could find, they were much cooler than every other practical light fixture on stage when we got in the space. I opened the tubes and added a piece of orange gel from my lighting designer to warm them up.

Sconces on stage
Sconces on stage

Here they are on stage. While they are very similar to modern tube sconces, they have just enough subtle period detail to help create the world on stage.

Lit sconces
Lit sconces

These sconces are so lit.

Blood Cannon Video

For our production of Teresa Rae King last spring at Triad Stage, we ended the show with a murder-suicide. The director asked if we could have a blood cannon to create two gunshot exit wound splatters on the transparent walls. Of course I said yes, and then immediately went away to learn what a blood cannon was and how to build one.

Now that it is complete, I put together this video showing how it worked.

Blood Cannon

Benches from Beautiful Star

A few months ago, Triad Stage put on their Christmas show, Beautiful Star. Though it was a remount, it had some major design changes this year. For the props shop, we needed to build six church benches that could be rearranged throughout the show to create various “locations.”

For the quatrefoil cut-out, I laid out the pattern with a compass and cut it with a jigsaw. I sanded it smooth using a sanding drum that was nearly the same diameter as the individual circles in the pattern.

Cutting the quatrefoils
Cutting the quatrefoils

I took the time to make one of the quatrefoils as perfect as possible, and then used a pattern cutting bit on my router to cut the rest of the side panels. I needed twelve panels for the six benches I was making.

So many panels
So many panels

The team wanted the benches to be able to stack on top of each other, sit up on their sides, and otherwise act as instant scenery. They also needed to support the weight of actors standing on them, but be lightweight enough for children to carry them.

I routed a groove down the sides of all the legs. My jig kept the groove in the center of the leg and set stop points for the top and bottom as well. I also cut a tongue on the side panels, which you can see in the previous photos.

Routing the joints
Routing the joints

In the picture below, you can see I also cut a mortise and tenon for the apron to connect to the leg, and a notch for the leg to fit up into the seat. Additionally, the aprons and side panels were attached to the seat with pocket hole screws. This sucker was going to be strong.

Fitting it together
Fitting it together

The joints made the whole bench pretty sturdy even without glue, but once it was glued and screwed together, it was rock solid.

The unpainted bench
The unpainted bench

We glazed the seat with a dark brown and painted the sides white. During tech we added the white border around the seat to finish off the look. Now we have six lightweight church benches that can be used in a whole host of shows.

Beautiful Star bench
Beautiful Star bench

Video: Fake Hairspray

This week’s companion video for The Prop Effects Guidebook is the last one before the book releases this Friday! It is a short one too, demonstrating a can of fake hairspray, sometimes known as “haze in a can.” Though short, I think props people should see this product in action, since it can solve a lot of “burst of steam” type of challenges.

Hairspray

You can watch all the companion videos on YouTube.

The Prop Effects Guidebook is available for pre-order now at most major retailers.