Poplar and Walnut Spice Rack

OK, so it kind of made me feel like I was in high school woodshop, but my brother-in-law really needed a loaded spice rack for his wedding.

I built this one to fit bottles from Penzey’s (well worth a visit if you’ve never seen them) — short ones on top, then regular sized ones in the middle. I added some extra room for those big jars of BBQ seasoning that you get at the grocery store, plus a few little drawers for things like nutmegs and may leaves that Penzey’s likes to use as packing material.

The drawers were dovetail practice — there were all totally free-form to give it that hand-made character…. probably a little too much of that hand-made character in this case!

I built the drawers first, then I built the rack around them to get a just-right fit. There aren’t any slides or stops — they just sit in there and stop against the wall behind the rack.

And here was my excuse to buy a scroll saw!