Make a Kumiko Tea Chest!

Join Mike Pekovich and make a beautiful tea chest in this five-day class.

Sharing a cup of tea with friends is an excellent way to spend an afternoon or end a meal. The experience is better by serving tea selections in a handmade chest. This practical and quietly elegant tea chest offers a lot of woodworking challenges in a small project. You can also apply the skills you learned in this class for future projects.

The class will cover tips for fast, accurate dovetails when building the case. You will create mitered liners that divide contents and fine-tune the fit of miters with a hand plane for seamless joints. You’ll also come away with a novel strategy for adding a lid to a box. The lid hinges open and slides side-to-side, revealing the contents without removing them.

Additionally, you’ll finish the chest off with wound cord handles and Kumiko panels. Kumiko is a traditional Japanese latticework technique that is fun and can brighten up just about any project.

Key Learning Points

• Kumiko
• Sliding lids
• Dovetails and Mitres
• Handtool work
• Hinge strategies for sliding flip lids

Mike, a long-time woodworker and instructor, is the creative director and editor at Fine Woodworking magazine and the author of The Why and How of Woodworking.

Please Note: the $140 materials fee includes hinges, hardware, Kumiko materials, cord, and case materials.