the garden bench is done.

This is the story of making this bench, from a piece of sequoia log. Two summers ago my friend Brian and I milled a sequoia tree into lumber. I took one of the leftover pieces thinking I would make it into a bench. The time has come and I need to get the bark off. The wood has dried so the bake came off easily with just a hammer and a little effort. After the initial bark removal I had to scrape off the remaining bark, and then sand the uneven surface. This gave me a nice clean natural surface. I trued up the ends on the band saw. Next I worked on the top. I really should do this with a hand plane, but I am more skilled with the belt sander. With a very ruff 36 grit it worked great. Then I went over it with the orbital sander.
The body of the bench was ready at this point, I had to think about the legs. First I tried making large chunks of wood for the legs but there was no way I was going to get them to fit the irregular surface of the bench. Then I thought about casting concrete legs formed to the underside of the bench, this seemed like a lot of work. In the end I decided to try shoving steel formwork stakes into the bench for legs. At the skinny end of the bench I had to add some material for the legs to attach to. I cut a slot in the bottom of the bench to receive a second piece of wood. The first piece of wood I made I decided was not going to be think enough, I cut a bigger piece. I glued the new wood piece into place. with a lot of glue, and let it dry. After a little sanding it was time to mount the legs. the legs are friction fit, like big nails. There, one bench. I hit the edges with a round over bit in the router, this will make it a little more comfortable. Now we are outside for some finish. and there we have it, one garden bench.