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A CLASSIC REVISITED

Design considerations for gate leg tables

Of the many applications of spindle turning, furniture making is the most interesting to me because of its fascinating history. It gives me the chance to copy old pieces, reinterpret work I have seen, or create entirely new designs. I think furniture work is "accessible" to most turners, because furniture parts are manageable in size, and we encounter examples frequently in our daily lives. In this article I will explore the designs of gate leg tables: a type considered a classic of early American decor, but having its roots in earlier baroque styles from Europe. Turnings have been used in furniture since King Tut, but in no period was turning more important than the baroque, because turning is a highly efficient process which was utilized to create the wide variety of ornamentation and detail characteristic of that style. The purpose of this article is not to show you how to make a table exactly like the one illustrated here, but to discuss the variations which I considered, and to help you in designing your own table. I offer here only one example, and suggest that picture books and museums provide many more. Included in this article are some of my procedures, which I hope will be interesting and/or informative. There are many steps to making a table, requiring a variety of operations. For example, making the top involves joining boards together to sum up the necessary width of each leaf, and planing them. Next is the shaping of the "rule joint" which allows the leaf to fold down and still maintain a pleasing form. Then the layout of the ellipse (more on this later) and finally the smoothing of the top. After the parts of the frame are turned, they must be joined by mortises and tenons. The table pictured here, for example, has 24 of these joints.

DESIGN RESOURCES

To recreate an old piece, one must have archetypes to work from. Many catalogs of historical styles of furniture have been assembled, and one of the most noteworthy is Furniture Treasury by Wallace Nutting. Nutting documented many periods of furniture, but obviously his favorite was "pilgrim century", (1630 to 1730). His book from the 1920's was an early attempt at a large photographic compilation. (Vols. I and II combined by MACMILLAN has 5000 photos.) His work awakened a new appreciation for the old styles. There are many interesting things which could be said about Wallace Nutting: that he was opinionated, tyrannical, dogmatic; and probably all are true. But Nutting had great knowledge and impeccable taste. He was appalled by the reproductions being made at the time. He couldn't understand why someone would copy a BAD example of furniture. So he started his own shop in Framingham, Massachusetts, where he manufactured what we would call today "museum quality" reproductions. In Nutting's shop, only the best were copied, and only the best techniques were employed. For example, he has this to say about dowel joints: "The dowel is the bane of furniture. It is weak from the first, rickety shortly, a disgrace to the maker, a sorrow and a shame to the owner, the shoddy symbol of a shoddy age." (1930 catalog) The furniture made by Nutting in Framingham was of such high quality that in recent years, various appraisal houses have reprinted his catalogs in an effort to sort things out. After studying Nutting's fuzzy photos for decades, I discovered the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Connecticut. J.P. Morgan purchased the Wallace Nutting collection of original antiques for the museum. This museum I have called "the little gem" - I highly recommend a visit if you are interested in American (especially New England) styles of art and decor. My pilgrimages there provide boundless inspiration for this spindle turner.

INTERPRETATION AND VARIATIONS

Often people say "I hate gateleg tables because I always bump my knees!". The short overhang of the top, especially at the ends was a design feature reinforced by the common use of a drawer. To modernize the table, I have skipped the drawer and increased the overhang on the ends to about a foot. This allows a person to sit on the end without hitting the frame. On some tables, only the legs are turned, but I prefer to turn both the vertical and horizontal members. This includes the upper rail of the gate even though this is not usual. This brings the total number of turnings for this type of table to 16. A table with four gates may have 8 more. All gate leg tables have at least one frame structure added to the main frame (half lapped into it) which pivots on one of its legs (from the apron to the bottom rail), and this "gate" is pulled out to support a leaf which is hinged at the top. There are two main types of gate leg tables: those with one gate on each side, and those with two. There are also "one leaf² gateleg tables, both rectangular and diamond (intended for a corner). Another type is the trestle frame, where gates pivot from adjacent planes separated only by the width of a narrow board. These trestle types are extremely thin when folded down. There is a tendency for a leaf which is supported only at one point to be flexible at the corners. For this reason most gate leg tables have elliptical tops. The grain may or may not run parallel to the major axis, but it would always run parallel to the joint. It is important that the support point of the gate leg be about 3/4 of the way out on the leaf. Those with double gates can be rectangular, especially large versions. On these, the gates usually swing out from the center, but some very large tables have double gates which swing in from the corners (pivot near the center of main rail). Such tables have frames which, when opened, resemble an asterisk. The first step in designing a gate leg table is to draw the top view (illustrated). Many of the important measurements are determined here: the dimensions of the frame, the overhang of the top at the ends, the dimensions of the top, and the radius of the gates. The center section of the top is a couple of inches wider than the frame, and from this, the width of the leaves can be determined. Allow 20" to 24" of perimeter for each person to be seated. Of course no drop leaf can be wider than the height of the table or it would hit the floor. The center part of the top can be any width however, and this fact has allowed the wide variation which is seen in gate leg tables.

LAYOUT OF THE MAIN RAIL

Usually there is enough space between the corner legs and the gate legs to allow a turned portion on the main rail (which is the bottom rail on the long side). This is an important decision, because there are four pommels in that case. It is best to extend the pommels an inch or two beyond the edge of each intersection, but this is a matter of taste. If the pommels are too long, they could make the frame look heavy in proportion to the turnings. If however the stock is light for the size of the frame, this can be used to advantage. Depending on the angle of view, a square can appear up to 1.4 times larger than a round of the same size. These things are difficult to judge from normal projected view drawings. In my experience, 8/4 stock will yield about 1 - 3/4" finished squares which work well for medium sized tables.

 

DRAWING ELLIPSES

There are many methods of drawing ellipses, including the so-called "four center method" which I do not recommend because it is only an approximation. For large work such as table tops I use the string method, as follows. Establish the major and minor axes of the ellipse, then locate the foci of the ellipse using the following construction: using one half of the major axis as radius and one of the end points of the minor axis as the center, strike two arcs on the major axis. The drawing of the ellipse is made on the reverse (down) side of the table top after the rule joint has been cut. Nails are driven at the foci, and string is tied to each nail in a loop which just reaches one of the outside points. A pencil riding in this loop will describe an ellipse. Non-stretchy string such as nylon twine works well. One other thing which is necessary to making the process run smoothly is having a groove around the pencil, just above the point, for the string to run in. The corner legs and the gate legs are different. This occurs because the gate must fold flat against the side of the frame and into the half-laps. The corner legs carry the primary motif, and the gate legs have an abbreviated version. The shortening of the turned part is about 2 - 1/2" below the apron and 2 - 1/2" above the rail. This variation of the turning is usually accomplished by placing an element of about 2 - 1/2" at the top and at the bottom of the pattern. On the gate legs, these elements are simply eliminated. [illustration] Beneath each pivot leg is a dummy foot. Some old tables don't have them. Probably they are lost.

Detail of the table pictured on the front cover shows how the gateleg turning pattern (right) is abbreviated, compared with the corner leg turning (left) to accommodate the rail.

 

CONSTRUCTION OF THE FRAME

Woodturners are always looking for quick ways to do things, and so it is often seen that rails have pins turned on their ends. These are fitted into drilled holes in the legs. This is an inferior method of joinery. To produce a high quality piece of furniture, mortise and tenon joints are the only choice. When joining 1 - 3/4" square stock, I use the following measurements for mortise and tenon joints: Width of mortise: 7/16"
Length of tenon: 1 - 1/8"
Top shoulder: 1/8"
Bottom shoulder: none
I make a 1" top shoulder on a 3 - 1/2" apron.
On the gate legs the mortises are centered, but those on the corner legs are offset to the outside (3/8" from edge) Tenons may be pegged, but modern adhesives make this unnecessary. Pegs add an interesting detail.

This 21"high "stool-table" is another piece of furniture typical of the Colonial period. It is a less ambitious project than a gateleg, requiring only eight turnings which are all similar and fairly short. The top is 22" by 15" by 5/8", while the frame measures 17" by 14" at the floor.

 

THE APPEAL OF THE BAROQUE

Recreating Baroque pieces of furniture such as a gateleg table can be a challenge. To take on such a project, one must be motivated. On one hand I have a love for woodturning itself: a thrill which does not seem to fade, even after 35 years. On the other hand, I feel a powerful attraction to these pieces of furniture. When I see them in books, or especially at museums, they speak to me. They say, "This was made by a woodturner like you - a person who worked hard to develop the same skills you have worked at - and who experienced the same joy you feel at its successful execution." Historical analysis tells me that the woodturners of old who produced these masterful works were up against far greater odds than we are today. Without electric motors or iron machinery, they were lucky to have even a water wheel belted to a crude lathe made almost entirely of wood. Yet artistically the turners of the period were in the right place at the right time, because baroque decor was in style. They lived in a time when the woodturner was free to express himself with all the lavish detail he could muster. Being at the center of furniture design of the period must have made the turner feel indispensable.