Gallery — The Dogwood Woodwrights

Mantles

Our own living room

Our own house. Great care went into staying true to the era of the home: every brick was cleaned and reused, and the red oak for the paneling and mantle was salvaged from a house built in 1939 in Alcoa. Only the mantle was planned — then demolition showed the masonry was in pitiful shape, so the masonry got done too. Sword miters, coped moldings and attention to proportion make it the focal point of the room.

A finished fireplace wall with paneling and sconces — After: the fireplace wall

A living room before work: bare brick fireplace and plain walls — Before

A solid wood mantle shelf on a brick fireplace, with antique hand planes resting on it — A solid mantle shelf for a brick fireplace

Paneling

A paneled reading nook with built-in bookshelves — Paneled reading nook

A bare corner of a room with two windows and a radiator, before the reading nook was built — The corner before the nook

A herringbone wood feature wall beside a stair rail — Herringbone feature wall

A tongue-and-groove ceiling laid in a diamond pattern — A diamond-pattern tongue-and-groove ceiling, Blackberry Mountain

Doors

Carriage doors for a barn

This project made me fall in love with making doors. I had hung and installed plenty, but I had never built one from nothing — then a superintendent I worked with asked me to build the doors for his new barn. In our spare time we designed, built and installed these massive 4×8′ carriage doors. They’re holding up well today, and I expect they will for many years to come.

Wood barn doors with black strap hinges on an outbuilding — Carriage doors

A garage door opening

These garage doors had seen their prime pass. I replaced the central column with an 8×8 pressure-treated post, sealed it top and bottom and anchored it to a steel plate, then wrapped the whole frame in mitered 3/4″ white oak so each piece reads as one solid member. Loose tenon joinery, oak plugs over the fasteners, and a tongue-and-groove soffit to finish. Now the garage matches the beauty of the home around it.

Two carriage-style wood garage doors with glass panels under a copper-roofed canopy, set in a brick wall — The new opening

A coal door

This coal door was in need of replacement. I stripped the opening back to the masonry, patched mortar where needed, then built, finished and installed the frame and door in four days! Smaller doors like this are a lot of fun, and they can spruce up crawlspaces, basements, plumbing access and other spots that usually get ignored.

The old coal door before replacement: weathered, peeling white boards in a brick wall — Before

A new four-panel wood coal door set into a brick wall — Finished

A door with a glazed panel

Are there more doors or wheels in the world? The jury is out, but I’d love to make you another door! Any size, interior or exterior — built with its frame for your home, and made to last for generations.

A wood door with a glazed upper panel and black strap hinges, standing open outdoors — Glazed door

Mason Simpson at his workbench, boring a hole with a hand brace — In progress at the bench

Beams

An exposed beam ceiling over tongue-and-groove boards — Beamed ceiling

Millwork

A wood canopy with a copper roof on knee braces over a glazed side door, beside a brick wall — Mortise and tenon knee braces

A wood panel scribed to follow the face of a fieldstone wall — Beam scribed to fieldstone

A wood-cased kitchen pass-through window with fretwork corners beside a paneled door frame, on a yellow stenciled wall — Kitchen pass-through window and door frame

A louvered wood cabana set into a stone house wall — A louvered cabana built into the stone wall of a house

Windows

A kitchen window

A kitchen window gets looked at more than any other window in your home. This one has a retractable shade hidden in its upper soffit, and the lower part of the soffit is held on with magnets so the shade can still be reached.

A corner kitchen window cased in wood — Corner kitchen window

A soffit built above a bank of windows to conceal roller shades — The shade soffit

The work