Blot on the Landscape.

Back in the summer (and what a glorious summer it was, for a change)  I was nattering to the editor of F&C, Derek Jones about this and that.
We happened to be at Pete Sefton's annual summer bash held during the hottest part of July and where we were it was particularly sweltering.

During the course of the day, he asked me if I'd do a couple of things for one of his clients, an old boy who wanted a desk blotter.  He apparently writes everything out in longhand using a fountain pen...very 'old school' but nothing, I should add, remotely wrong with that.  I still use my fountain pen very occasionally, usually at Christmas time for the cards.

To cut a long story sideways, this is the end result of that little commission, a desk blotter in faux suede and Indian Ebony as Derek's client stipulated that the wood used should be black.

Although it looks deceptively simple, each part had to made, fitted, polished and assembled separately as I couldn't afford to get the suede surface contaminated with glue or wax.

It consists  of a 6mm ply base with the faux suede glued down on both sides.  The corner pieces consist...

...of a mitred 'L' shape with 2mm veneer on the underside and 3mm on the top (really to indicate which is the upper surface) and by carefully building these corners I was able to make enough clearance for a sheet of  blotting paper to slip underneath.  The sides consist of 'U' section pieces of ebony glued onto the edged to cover the quite untidy edge of suede.

It's turned out quite well, so now I have to work out how much to charge for it...answers on a postcard?