Wood Frame Glass Work

Sometimes, using different medium can make great result. Like a wooden frame to encace glass work. Well I only had a part in the Wood frame, the glass part was what I had as a starting point.

I got a commission to do a wooden frame around a glass wok art piece, roughly squared dimensions of 24 inches by 24 inches. It is also pretty heavy so the construction would need to be pretty beefy to be able to hang.

Here is a picture of the completed frame

Wooden Frame for glass art

Wooden Frame for glass art

The person that owned the glass wanted to hang the glass on a wall. The method to hang this massive piece was definitely a french cleat. The frame had enough back clearance so I could use thick enough stock.

Construction

As for the corner joinery, came the challenge on what to use for joinery. The dimensions of the wooden parts did not give too many options for something that needed to be pretty solid. The corner construction ended up as half lap, reinforces with dowels at each corner.

I used West Epoxy to glue up the wooden pieces. The glass is captured in a groove within the frame. The reveal on the front is a heavy 1/8 inch. I wanted to keep as much in the back to hang the french cleat.

The groove to hold the glass got routed @ the router table and the length was finessed with hand tools. The glass is a pretty irregular material and one of its challenge it to account for these. Not a complaint, just a fact of the materiel.

For a finish, the customer asked that he applied the finish himself. The wood was sanded smooth to about 150 grit. The wood used is maple. I wanted something pretty solid to carry the weight off the glass.

Impressions

The customer in really pleased with the result. I saw a picture and the frame is stained to fit the decor. Unfortunately I was not able to capture the final picture.