Cherry and Walnut Sculpted Bench

I made this bench for my wife for Christmas Made of 2"thick walnut and 3 1/2 " cherry hope you like it.

I started with a slab cut piece of cherry with live edge on both sides 3 1/2 " think 13 wide x 38" long removed the bark and planed down to 3 1/8th

I couldn't find any walnut wide enough so I joined 2 pieces 8"s wide 2 1/4 's thick

next I milled out the cherry to 3 1/4 28's long leaving the live edges and the walnut to 13' x 18' x 2' thick I wet them with water to show the grain. I like!

next layed out my 10 deg. dovetails starting from center out to leave live edge 

made the rough cuts with the band saw

removed excess wood and cleaned up dovetails this step takes awhile

marked out pins in the walnut

cut and cleaned up pins

mated up  I took my time with the clean up and the dovetails fit very nicely. Glued and ready for shaping

Marked out with patterns I made and roughed out with a chainsaw blade in my side grinder. Then various sandpaper starting with 24 grit

I used planes, rasps and sand paper to work it down until I was happy with the shape

3 1/4' dovetails are hard to get perfect

put a little glue and some cherry dust from my band saw let dry and sanded

they came out pretty good

next I used chisels, rasp and sand paper to bring the legs up to the shape of the live edge 

a little scraping and sanding all over to 220 grit and it's ready for the finish

I used a semi gloss poly for the finish. This is after the first coat

5 coats sanded with 320 grit between coats still wet in picture

Its finished I had to let it set over night between coats of poly. but total time was about 12 hours not including searching for the wood. I payed $40.00 for the cherry it had been drying for about 3 years I was told. The walnut had been drying for about a year it was a little green but I think it will be ok. It was 2 1/2 thick x 8" x 9' I got it for $30.00 because it had a bad edge witch I didn't need anyway with the finish and sandpaper I got less than $100.00's in it I wish I had used gloss instead of semi But I'm well pleased I hope my wife is.Thanks for looking Peace Ricky