Texas Bar Builders is the culmination of my 35 years of diverse custom woodworking in a wide range of applications: door and sash, custom furniture, complex stairs, display and cabinetry. Although all of these sorts of work are welcome, we want to focus here on the design and production of custom fine wood bars: home and private bars as well as commercial bars for hotels, pubs and restaurants.
On this page we walk through the production of a recent large public bar for a military facility in Anniston, Alabama. Other custom bar designs are shown on the home page. Click pictures to view enlarged.
the making of the Alabama Tavern
The start of a massive bar like the Alabama tavern is a truckload of rough sawn material. It is first thicknessed to various purposes, and parts begin to appear. Here some first milled parts are inspected for the mortice-and-tenon fit.
Here’s a stack of parts coming off the shapers,
and some 90-degree corner panels. To obtain a smooth satin finish, open-pore woods like red oak must be paste-filled thoroughly, then sanded before staining. Before glue-up, those areas which could be “masked” by the glue are pre-stained.
A machine was constructed to produce these radius panels to avoid the use of veneers, see the video below.
LOFTING UP
The footprint is laid out on the shop floor, and the foundation components are secured;
then sub-assemblies are tested for fit.
PRE-ASSEMBLY
pre-assembly is done in shop, of the entire bar, to assure on-site installation holds no surprises.
FINISHED!
Three of us installed the Aabama Tavern in 3 days. Overall views give some idea of the scope.
A couple of details are below; the bartender’s gate, canopy corner, the corner below, and the Silestone top.
