Carved Grand Piano Foldable Shelf

Hello everyone! Today I'm going to show you how I carved this fantastic foldable shelf that looks like the insides of a grand piano! I have to admit that this shelf revolutionized the spaces of my kitchen: you can't understand the usefulness of a foldable table in a tiny space until you have one......... or MAKE one! ;)

• A large wooden board (I used about 40x60cm of material)
• V gouge
• A jigsaw tool
• A pair of folding shelf brackets (mine were 40cm long)

First of all, I drew a pencil sketch of the carving directly on the wooden board. I decided to go for a reduced number of piano keys and strings, otherwise the carving may be too dense and the table might result uncomfortable to use. If you want to replicate my design, a better picture of the finished product is visible in the following steps.

I used a jigsaw tool to cut the table to the desired shape. The final lenght of the piano is about 60 cm.

It was finally time to carve the piano design using the V gouge. It was my first time ever using this tool, so the result might not exactly look "professional", but I'm pretty satisfied! If I could change anything, I would perform the next step (darkening the wood) before carving the strings, because I ended up liking the light strings concept more, so I could have saved a bit of time.

I decided to give the wood a few layers of darkener. I should have probably avoided darkening the "white" keys of the piano, but the final look is not bad at all (kinda authentic). I also decided to spread an additional coat on some specific parts of the piano, as shown in the last pictures. Finally, I carved out again the strings to give the piece a bit more contrast. I'm really happy on how it turned out!

Finally, a clear coat of paint was applied to protect the surface.

The final step was of course mounting the table. I took a pair of foldable shelf brackets and my father helped me to carefully align them on the wall, making sure that the ends wouldn't stick out the piano once screwed on. The final result is AMAZING, a true piece of art! I really recommend you to try and make one yourself! :)

Let me know if you liked this little project. Don't forget to follow me on instagram @fabcolella, I would appreciate that :D