Door design...

I left off having completed the back panel. I've been looking forward to working on the front doors for quite some time now as they are a large part of the focal point of the piece. I had some nicely figured tiger maple also known as curly maple squirreled away for quite some time. After a change of heart, I decided to go shopping for a more dramatic piece of tiger maple with which to make the door panels. A couple of options were available to me, either bookmatch each door panel from a narrower board ( more commonly available) or make an effort to find a wider board and have each door panel one continuous piece. The thickness of the tiger maple board also becomes important since I also intend to raise each panel within its door frame.

As luck would have it, with the aid of my wife and some diligent searching, we stumbled onto the correct tiger maple board at a local exotic hardwood dealer. It is just the right width board and substantial thickness to accommodate the raised part. Simultaneous to this, I've had a change of heart about the design of the front doors. I'm beginning to prefer straight lines for the rails instead of the previous curved/angled rail design. I prefer this to be able to add a small design element, shadowing, into the design for the lower and upper rails. I will be discussing this with the client very soon and proceed from there.

In the photo, a layout of the doors with the straight lines is shown. The bottom rail is fractionally wider than the upper rail and the stiles. The vertical stiles would be set back fractionally to create the shadow effect and emphasize the fact that the top and bottom rails are extending to the edges of the door frames.