Originally posted: January 16, 2017
Residents of Iowa, North Dakota and Utah submitted the two tabletops and one desktop that won the Grand Prizes in the Tables & Desks Contest on Instructables.com. Entries were accepted from November 7, 2016, through January 2, 2017. The 38 total prize winners will receive tools from the Woodcraft , along with Instructables prize packs.
Grand Prize Winners
Grand Prize winners are Matt Heath of West Des Moines, Iowa, Concrete and Wood Slab Table; Ernest Garner of Wahpeton, North Dakota, Zen Garden CNC End Table; and Nathan Sellers of American Fork, Utah, Glowing River Desktop.
“Congratulations to the three Grand Prize winners, as well as all the other winners,” Woodcraft vice president for sales and marketing Vince Grlovich, said. “If you want to see creativity in action, visit www.instructables.com/contest/tablesdesks2016, and check out all the winning entries.”
Concrete and Wood Slab Table
In his six-step how-to instructions, Matt Heath wrote, “This is a fun project that incorporates different materials (wood, concrete, metal), and relatively speaking it can be a pretty quick build. The combination of wood and concrete in this table is what makes it a challenging build because the materials are worked so much differently, but this is also what makes it such a unique table.” For the centerpiece of his table, Heath used a cedar log from his back yard. Once the log was transformed into a usable slab, it was placed in a form, and concrete, made dark with dye, was poured on both sides.
Zen Garden CNC End Table
Ernest Garner’s idea for this enclosed Zen Garden built into an end table is one of many ideas that he conceives and sketches while watching television with his family. “Many of my ideas never leave my project pages. This one did,” Garner wrote in his 19-step how-to instructions. “I have built 3D printers; I have also built some simple furniture (bookshelf, bench, etc.), but I have never built anything that combines technology into furniture. So I really thought this would be a fun project.” The garden features layers of river rock that encircle sand where a small ball can be controlled to push through the sand and make pathways.
Glowing River Desktop
Nathan Sellers and his wife wanted to update their office to make a family work space. Rather than purchase a desktop to cover the drawer bases they had purchased for the 11-foot wall, Sellers opted to design one – with a glowing “river” in the middle. He chose Douglas fir planks through which he routed out his river design. Using resin with glow powder and crushed glass mixed in it, he filled in the riverbed. “The resin portion is quite possibly the hardest part of the process. The real challenge is to work out the bubbles before the resin hardens,” Sellers wrote in his how-to instructions for the 13-step project.
Grand Prize winners will each receive a DeWalt 2-1/4 HP Three Base Router Kit, DeWalt 20V MAX Lithium-Ion Compact Hammerdrill and Impact Driver Combo Kit (3.0 AH), DeWalt 10" Miter Saw, Single Bevel, and a 3/8" DeWalt VSR Pistol Grip Drill with Keyless Chuck from Woodcraft, and an Instructables Prize Pack that includes an Instructables Robot T-Shirt and a stainless steel mug.
View All Winners Online
To view all 38 winning entries and read how the projects were built, visit www.instructables.com/contest/tablesdesks2016. Instructables’ members cast votes for contest entries, and then a panel of judges, including Instructables staff members and members of the Instructables community, rated the finalists. The averages of the ratings determined the winners.
Prizes provided by Woodcraft for other winners include:
•Five first place winners will each receive a Porter-Cable 20V Max Lithium-Ion 2-Tool Combo Kit that includes a drill driver and an impact driver.
•Ten second place winners will each receive a Rockwell ShopSeries RC3748, 5 Amp, Orbital Variable Speed Jigsaw.
•Twenty third place winners will each receive a WoodRiver 100-Piece Combo Brad-Point and Twist Drill Bit Box
•All the winners will receive an Instructables Prize Pack that includes an Instructables Robot T-Shirt and a stainless steel mug.
Instructables – described as The World’s Biggest Show and Tell – attracts 30 million plus viewers each month to its web-based documentation platform that allows passionate creators to share what they do and how they do it, as well as learn from and collaborate with others. Besides offering a place to showcase and store new projects, Instructables also sponsors ongoing competitions. To learn more about the Instructables, visit www.instructables.com.
For more information about Woodcraft, please contact the store nearest you, visit www.woodcraft.com
or call (800) 535-4482. To learn about Woodcraft franchise opportunities, visit
or email woodcraftfranchise@woodcraft.com.www.woodcraftfranchise.com
We hope you'll be inspired!