Charlie’s Flight Case Panel Shoe Shelves

Well, after many a month of enjoying other people’s projects, I finally did one I thought some of you might enjoy. This is yet another piece for our flat ordered by the boss. We had some nasty Ikea business before and I’m happy to get this as a replacement! I’ve been getting into some dovetail boxes (Leigh jig) and this was the culmination of an idea which was possible thanks to some really nice 500 mm wide quarter sawn boards I tripped over the other day.

I had wanted to do some sliding doors for a while and after finding the materials, I made a few scale models to aid me in design. You can see the version I was thinking about doing, possibly with a maple frame to suspend the boxes from. But,in the end simplicity won out and I went for the version you see here.

The whole process took about 6 days. I had just finished an art project making flight cases which inspired the black doors and recessed back panels. (The doors are made from 9 mm flight case ply). It’s a bit different and had loads of off cuts which I was happy to get rid of! At first I considered just drilling a hole in the doors, but happily I decided some nice stainless handles looked more professional. I routed 2×10 mm channels all around the interior front edge and planed all the edges of the doors so they slide nice and don’t jam in their fully closed positions. I finished with three coats of danish oil rubbed down in between with 0000 grade steel wool.