The LutyensGarden Bench

Turning our little yard in-to a landscaped gardenretreat has been one of

those back-burner projects mywife and I have managed toavoid since buying our housesix years ago. It's been easy todo because neither of us is agardener. As a woodworker, I'malways able to find constructiveprojects somewhere inside thehouse that are better suited tomy skills than moving earth andplanting flowers. Plus, I've de-cided that a proper gardenshould evolve slowly over theyears—four years ago we plant-ed a Japanese maple under thefringe of the huge Sycamorethat dominates the yard, and lastsummer I laid down a brickpatio outside the back porch.Good things shouldn't berushed, I tell myself.

Now that I work primarilyfrom home, the prospect of tak-ing daily work breaks in a morepleasant backyard nook has methinking more about the gar-dening part of our imaginarygarden. But over the wintermonths all I could do was plan,dream and defer. Then I saw apicture of the Lutyens gardenbench in a catalog. The benchhad the kind of distinctive ele-gance that I wanted my gardento have, but with a price tagnearing $2,000 in the catalog, Idecided to make one myself.

The original bench was de-signed 100 years ago by EdwinLutyens (1869-1944), a Britisharchitect and designer. Thebench's curvaceous crest railand lollipop-like front legs forma whimsical frame around theclassically regimented slats ofthe back and rolled armrests. An

Full-sized drawings and accurate templateshelp break a classic design into manageable parts

B Y T O N Y O ' M A L L E Y

eye-catching and comfortablethree-seater, it's no wonder theLutyens bench is still copied bydozens of outdoor furnituremanufacturers.

Some reproductions I've seenhave no bottom stretcher at thefront or back, and others haveboth. As I sketched and workedthrough drawings, I began tonotice that a bottom stretchereven with the front legs wouldrestrict a sitter's feet from goingwhere they naturally want togo—under the seat a few inch-es. As a compromise, I posi-tioned a stretcher under themiddle of the seat, tenoned intothe bottom side stretchers.

I worked out the details of theentire bench using full-sizeddrawings. I drew the bench, atvarious views, directly onto

-in. plywood. Because of themyriad joints, angles and curvesin this design, full-sized draw-ings were crucial to making theproject run smoothly. The draw-ings helped me not only to re-fine the design of the benchbefore committing any cuts tolumber but also to figure out theconstruction and necessary or-der of assembly.

Choose an appropriate woodfor outdoor useReproductions of the Lutyensgarden bench are typically,made of teak, but I ruled thatout immediately due to the cost.My bench would sit outsidepermanently because I didn'thave a place to store it indoorsover the winter, so weather re-sistance was a main require-ment. Spanish cedar is a goodmahogany-colored wood thatweathers better than real ma-

This classic bench design was built fromcypress to endure all four seasons. Loosetenons and dowel joints were all joined with aslow-setting, waterproof epoxy so that theentire bench could be assembled at once.

hogany, but I couldn't find anylocally. I looked at several im-ported hardwoods being mar-keted for deck building—ipefrom South America and jarrahfrom Australia among them—but these woods are very heavy,quite abrasive to tools and gen-erally hard to work. Highweight also helped me rule out

locally grown woods like whiteoak and locust.

I settled on cypress for its lightweight, good moisture resis-tance and moderate hardness. Itwas also available from a localsupplier at a good price and inthicknesses that would work—Iused 8/4 material for the benchframe and 4/4 material for the

seat boards, arm slats and backslats. If you want to avoid plan-ing rough lumber, cypress isavailable as dimensional lum-ber from many suppliers ofdeck-building materials.

Start with the seat frameThere's no better motivatorwhen making furniture than ac-

tual progress, so I like to startwith the easier parts of a projectand work my way up to themore difficult ones. In this casethe back of the bench was byfar the hardest part to make, so Idecided to build the rest of thebench first.

For each back leg, I face-glued two pieces of 8/4 stock. I

FULL-SIZED DRAWINGS AID LAYOUT

FRONT LEG REAR LEG

planed down the stock to in.thick (the actual thickness is notcrucial; just keep it as thick aspossible). I ripped the stockslightly oversized to 3 in., thenglued the slabs together. Theseam is visible only from theside, not from the front or back.Structurally, either approachwould be sound, but my ap-proach made the front view alittle cleaner. I planed the rest ofthe 8/4 stock down to its final

-in. thickness.I transferred the profile of the

back legs from my full-sizedside-view drawing and cut themout on the bandsaw (see thephotos above). I sanded thebandsawn surfaces on my 6-in.edge sander, but a block planeand some hand-scraping wouldwork just as well.

Both front legs can be cutfrom a single piece of stock,6 in. or wider, with the straightpart of the legs overlapping. Irough-cut the legs first, thenripped the inside edge of eachone on the tablesaw, stopping

Full-sized draw-ings lead to ac-curate tem-plates. Thedrawings makeit easy to checkmeasurementsand make a tem-plate for thelegs. Simplymark out theprofile on theblank (left), thenbandsaw the legto shape (right).

Mark legs at in-tersectionpoints. With thefront leg cut toshape, use aside-view draw-ing to mark outthe positionof the rail andstretcher (left).All frame mortis-es are centeredon the stock andare in. thick(right).

short of the top circle. Then Ibandsawed the final shape ofthe circle and the transition in-to the straight inside edge.

With all of the seat-frame partscut to size, it was time to cut themortises. Years ago, when I firstlearned woodworking, therewas a horizontal mortiser in theshop where I worked. With onesetup, this machine cuts mortis-es in both parts that form a joint;a separate piece of wood isused for the tenon (called aloose tenon). In most cases it's a

lot easier than cutting a tenonand routing a mortise, and theresulting joint is just as strong.Since then, the idea of cuttingmortises with a plunge routerhas never caught on for me, andI now use the mortiser on myRobland combination machine(see the photo below) for al-

DO COMBINATION MACHINES MAKE SENSE?

The deal I got on my used Robland X31 combination machine seven years ago was

too good to pass up. The Robland combines five tools: tablesaw with sliding table,

jointer, planer, spindle shaper and horizontal mortiser. Moving from one task to

another can be time-consuming, but the tool is heavy duty and high quality. For my

small shop and tight budget, the machine definitely has been worth the money.

most all joinery work, includingdoweling.

I centered the mortises in the-in.-thick rails and stretchers

and in the faces of the legs. Af-ter shaping the tenon stock andcutting the separate tenons tolength, I glued them into theends of all the rails and stretch-ers with epoxy. One caution,however: Before gluing thetenons into the seat rails, dry-as-semble the legs and side rails. Ifthe complementary anglesformed by the back-leg cantand the rails are off, the joints

One tenon fits all. The authormills tenon stock to thickness,rips it to width, then rounds overthe corners. By trimming them toshort lengths, he can make manytenons from one piece of stock.

won't close perfectly. To solvethe problem, simply scribe anew cut line and recut the backends of the side rails and sidestretchers for a perfect fit. (Besure to recut the two intermedi-ate seat rails at the same time.)

Also, because the tenons onthe front, rear and side seat railsintersect, I mitered them so thateach is as long as possible. I cutthe curve in the seat rails on thebandsaw and—at long last, itseemed—dry-assembled thebench frame, less its back.

The back is the mostdifficult section to makeGood design often leads to con-struction and assembly conun-

drums, and it's certainly truewith the back of this bench. Thevisual centerpiece aroundwhich the bench is designed,the back is deceptively well in-tegrated into the rest of thebench's structure (see the draw-ings above). But the requiredassembly sequence was not im-mediately obvious to me. Look-ing at the sturdy bench framedry-assembled, I wanted to glue

something up. But each assem-bly sequence I considered ledto a dead end involving theback of the bench.

After scratching my head fora long while, it became clearthat the entire bench, startingwith the back, would have to beglued up in one continuous as-sembly. It also would have beenpossible to glue up the backfirst and then the rest of the

bench frame, but I opted for asingle glue-up. I chose anepoxy from West Systems andused a hardener with a slightlylonger open time than the com-pany's standard hardener (seethe box on the facing page).

First I made a full-sized draw-ing of the entire back. Then Imade a template for shaping thecrest rail, which is made of twopieces connected at the center-

line with a mortise-and-tenonjoint. I drew a half pattern of thecrest rail on paper and refinedthe wavy curves with a lot of tri-al and error, using catalog pho-tographs as a visual guide. Aftertransferring the pattern to apiece of -in. plywood, I band-sawed the shape, then blendedthe curves using a belt sander,spindle sander and rasps. Itraced the shape onto the railhalves, then cut them out on thebandsaw, staying slightly out-side the line. Then I screwed thetemplate to the back faces of therail halves and trimmed themflush. The first pass with a pat-tern-routing bit trimmed abouttwo-thirds the thickness of theedge; a flush-trimming bit, withthe bearing riding on the edgealready shaped, cleaned up therest (see the photos at right).

Incidentally, each half of thecrest rail requires 8-in.-widestock or wider. I didn't have any8/4 material this wide, and Ididn't want seams in the face ofthe rail, so I face-glued twowide pieces of 4/4 stock.

I was less than thrilled withmy decision for two reasons.First, the front and back boardswere not well matched, so thegrain is noticeably differentwhen looking at the top edge ofthe crest rail. And because oneof the boards was a lot heavierthan the other, the laminatedstock bowed slightly after I hadplaned it to final thickness. Thelesson: select boards of similargrain and weight if you have toface-glue.

Next, I cut the mortises in thecrest rail and bottom rail of theback, in the two vertical stiles inthe back and in the top of the

SHAPING THE CREST RAIL

back legs. Because their oddshape precluded clamping tothe mortising table in the nor-mal fashion, I could not com-pletely cut the mortises for thetwo intermediate stiles into thecrest rail using my horizontalmortising machine. Neverthe-less, I clamped the rail halves atan angle and mortised in as faras possible, then deepened andfinished these two mortiseswith a drill and chisels. I cut thecenter vertical stile to fit be-

Many chances for refining the crest rail. Begin with a patternshaped on paper, then adjust it as you mark it out on plywood templatestock. Cut out the shape on the bandsaw and refine the template fur-ther with rasps and various sanding machines. With the templatescrewed to the face of the crest rail, use a pattern-routing bit in a routerto clean up the shape. A flush-trimming bit finishes the job.

tween the crest rail and bottomrail, rounding its top end tomatch the curve of the arch.Then I cut small mortises to jointhis center stile to both rails. Icould finally dry-assemble themain structural frame of theback, then cut all the slats to fit.

My plan was to fit all of theslats with a pair of dowels ineach end and drill the corre-sponding holes in all of the ver-ticals. At this time I wonderedabout the assembly sequence of

the back, with all of those slats.The main structural parts (bot-tom rail, crest rail, three stilesand back legs) come together inone direction, while all of theslats are joined in the perpen-dicular direction. The problemis with the slats that join to thecrest rail—if they were dow-eled, there would be no way to

CHOOSE GLUE SET TIME TO MATCH YOUR WORK

This is an outdoor bench, so I turned to epoxy (West Systems Epoxy; 517-684-

7286) because it is waterproof. But I learned that adding a slow-set hardener

would give me 50 minutes open time—more than the usual 9 to 12 minutes. For

simple applications, such as gluing loose tenons into place, I used the regular for-mula. But the hardener gave me enough time to do the final assembly all at once.

HAND-DRILLED MORTISESRolled arms are attached with dowels.With the back dry-fitted tightly into place, youstill have to drill dowel holes for the slats thatmake up the rolled arms. To make sure theangle is correct, use a bevel gauge canted to6° to guide a handheld drill.

bring the crest rail down ontothe stiles and also engage thedowels in the back slats at thesame time.

I'm sure there are other solu-tions, but I decided that all ofthe slats attaching to the crestrail would be butt-joined andreinforced with countersunkscrews from underneath. Addi-tionally, the slats under the cen-ter arch would have to beadded after the main assemblyby half-lapping them over thecenter stile. Between epoxy'sgood gap-filling ability andcarefully predrilled holes for thescrews, these butt joints shouldhold up just fine.

I cut all of the slats to fit with-in the assembled back frame. Toget the curved ends of the up-per slats, I held them in positionand marked right off the crestrail where they intersect. I band-sawed and sanded the ends tofit snugly, After cutting the halflaps in the center stile and thetwo top slats, I used the sameprocess to fit these last two slats.I drilled the dowel holes for all

of the slats on my horizontalmortiser.

Build the rolled armsand attach the seatOnce the components of theback had been cut and the join-ery fitted, I reassembled the en-tire bench dry (see the rightphoto below), then cut the armslats to fit. First I laid out the po-sition of each slat on the frontand back legs, then cut the slatssquare at the front and with a 6°angle at the back to correspondto the angle of the back (see thedrawings at left). I drilled anddoweled the ends of the armslats on my mortiser, thendrilled the corresponding holesin the back legs and crest railwith a hand drill using a bevelgauge as a guide (see the leftphoto below).

After all that, the most essen-tial part of the bench—theseat—still remained undone.The back edge of the rear-mostseat board is angled at 18° sothat it can snug up against theback legs and stiles. The front

ATTACHING THE SHAPED SLATS

Finishing the back. After themain components of the benchhave been glued up, the smallerslats can be set into place.

A smooth fit. Using a dado set onthe tablesaw, the two top slats arenotched to fit over the center stile.

Scribing the back slats. The upper slats on the back are scribed for atight fit. A bandsaw is used to cut them to shape, but final shaping isdone with rasps and sanding machines. The shaped ends of the slats arescrewed into place from underneath.

seat board is narrower and sitsflat on the square edge of thefront seat rail. The four middleseat boards are identical. Topromote rain runoff from theseat and reduce the likelihoodof splinters, I rounded over thetop edges of the seat boardswith a -in. roundover bit.

Using exposed screws in thetop of the seat boards woulddetract from the refined look ofthis bench and give water aplace to pool. And screwing upthrough the curved rails wouldrequire different-sized screwsor counterboring a differentdepth for each board. So I at-tached the seat boards to theframe from above with galva-nized deck screws. The holeswere counterbored, and I gluedplugs in them for a clean look.

Before the final glue-up, Isanded all of the bench parts,keeping the joined areas good

and flat. I went over all fouredges of the arms slats with an

-in. roundover bit. I used a-in. roundover bit to soften the

exposed parts of the curvedcrest rail and the front legs, be-ing careful to stop at the jointseams. After sanding, I assem-bled the bench with epoxy anda lot of clamps.

Well, my garden retreat is stillcomposed of a brick patio, a

Japanese maple and a fewpotted plants. Only now it'salso graced by a quite comfort-able and distinctive bench. ButI'm afraid it will take some in-spired landscaping and proba-bly more than a few years todevelop a garden that's worthyof the bench.

The last touch.Working from theback toward thefront, the authoruses spacers andscrews down theseat. Once inplace, bungs areepoxied intoplace over thecountersunkscrews.

Tony O'Malley is an editor, writer andwoodworker in Emmaus, Pa.