Need some Inspiration? Ask your fellow members!

We feel that today might be the perfect moment to put some of our members and their projects in the spotlight.

We have all been there: the inspiration and motivation to finish a project you started months ago suddenly disappears. What was supposed to be a quick fix, and looked so beautiful and easy in your imagination, turns out to be far more time consuming, intricate, and challenging than expected.

At our workshops, we have always tried to cultivate an environment where exactly those difficult moments can be overcome with the help of others who have gone through the same experience. The biggest advantage of a communal workshop? Many hands make light work.

In this post, we would like to present some projects and the stories of the members behind them, and hopefully inspire everyone who dreams of taking on a bigger project. With the right help, every build is possible.

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Alsasdair - Shoe Cabinet

I feel both relieved and happy to finally finish this project. Never in my wildest dreams did I

think it would take so long and be so full of challenges. In the end, I worked on the cabinet for more than 1.5 years (and hundreds of hours). Along the journey, I made every mistake that I could possibly have made, but in the end, I learned a ton about woodworking...and the true meaning of patience! I definitely want to build more furniture at some point in the future, but in the meantime, I'm keen to apply my new-found skills to smaller projects. 

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Jeanette - Console

I have always wanted to learn woodworking, but I'd never had the opportunity before finding Knock on Wood. After doing the side table & tray cours and the noble wood box course, I decided to adventure in building this console with the help of Rafael, one of the instructors of Knockonwood. I knew it was going to be a huge challenge, from choosing the types of wood (walnut and maple), the dimensions and the position of the legs. It took several weeks, around 30-35 hours of work, but what a fun project. I learned how to chisel and I'm more confident in how to use the table saw and the router table. Huge thanks to Rafael for all his help. I look forward to many more projects!

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Jerome - Portage

This project is a pair of large hardwood planter boxes designed as both functional garden pieces and structural experiments. Each planter is about 180 cm by 42 cm and built with an ipé box resting on six massaranduba legs, dimensioned to handle roughly 250 kg of wet soil plus the box’s own weight. The design phase was long and meticulous, combining technical reading, personal engineering judgment, and intensive back‑and‑forth with an AI assistant to validate mechanical constraints and load paths. Working dense hardwoods made machining and joinery challenging, so the frame relies on brackets, screws, glue, and staggered brace heights to avoid weakening the legs. The interior is lined with geotextile and plastic film to separate soil from wood, and everything is finished with hardwood oil. The project also benefited from advice and suggestions from the Knock on Wood team, especially on the first planter.