Rustic Wooden Keys {Inspired by Pottery Barn}

Back in September, Handan told me that she had a great project for me. She had just published a post about her knockoff Pottery Barn outdoor pumpkins, and she was riding a glorious wave of accolades and adulation. She had knockoffs on the brain, so what better way to capitalize than to make some more knockoffs? And who better to make them than me? She showed me a picture and pointed towards the basement.

I protested that there was a good movie on TV that required viewing. 

She thrust the picture closer to my face. She pointed to the basement. 

I informed her that my video game characters hadn’t seen me all day, so they were probably missing me. Even robots get the blues, I warned her.

She pointed at the picture, then stabbed her finger towards the basement.

I changed tactics and told her that I needed to mow the lawn. The grass couldn’t possibly survive another day without my immediate attention.

Picture. Basement.

I knew the fight was lost. The fix was in. It was over before it even began. I took the picture and gave it a closer look.

Where the hell did she get a Pottery Barn catalog, anyway? She’s never even been to a Pottery Barn! Meh, probably best not to ask. 

I had learned long ago not to question her sources. Or her motives. Or her opinions. Or her wardrobe. It’s an unforgiving world, and a man must learn quickly if he is to survive.

*****

Yeah, so I could make those keys. But I wasn’t keen on the crossed ones, so I decided to make two big ones and one little one. We had some old, mismatched chair spindles in the basement, but they were a little too mismatched. I wouldn’t have been able to stain them to a uniform color, so I bought some table legs from Home Depot instead. 

My original thought was to make the bow (that’s the part of the key you squeeze between your thumb and forefinger) at the thick end and the bit (that’s the business end of the key) at the tapered end. The problem with that idea was that it would be hard to attach the bit to a tapered cylinder. I waited for an idea to spark in my gray mush, but after a few sputters and backfires, I flip-flopped my original thought and decided to make the bow at the tapered end and the bit at the big end.

Since the table legs were some sort of hardwood (they looked and felt like oak, but they didn’t smell like it), I went with oak for the bit. Unless you have a bandsaw, I would recommend using a softer wood, like pine. It would be much easier to cut and shape using hand tools (jigsaw, sandpaper, etc) than oak. I had a lot of spare oak in the basement from a shelf that I had built for our son a few years back and recently disassembled. One of the planks is pictured above. I wanted the bit to be a little fancier than the Pottery Barn keys – something with curves and angles. I grabbed a pencil and a ruler and started to sketch out a design.

When I was satisfied, I cut out the design on the bandsaw and then used that piece as a template for the other two.

I sanded off the old stain so I could pick another color once the keys were built.

With the bits cut out, I turned my attention to the bows. The Pottery Barn keys had used the same shape bow for all of the keys, but the short key’s bow was smaller. I’m lazy. That would require additional work that I was just not willing to give. If the bits were all the same, the bows could be the same, too! I traced one half of a bow onto some scrap MDF. This would serve as the template from which I would make all of the bows. 

I cut out my template on the bandsaw.

Then I traced the outline of the template onto a piece of oak. Again, if you’re not using big machines, don’t use oak.

I then ran the piece through my table saw.

And then cut out the shape with my bandsaw.

I cut as close to the line as I was able.

It wasn’t perfect, but I smoothed everything down by sanding. I first hit the outside curve with a disc sander.

And then tackled the inside curve with a spindle sander.

Looking much better!

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