Langly Walnut Shelving
Working with my friend Spencer Graves, a production designer based in Los Angeles, I was consulted to build custom walnut shelving for the new store front of Langly, a camera bag retailer in their new retail store and office space in downtown, LA.
The location itself is an industrial warehouse space with high ceilings, sunlights, exposed beams and tall white walls with a window in the center of the shop looking into an upstairs loft/conference room. The walls have all the electric paneling in place and the conduit runs in every direction with no chance to move it anywhere. The shelving design features long steel tubing hung from the ceiling and bent in a large U shape.
Using the same material as the electrical conduit, the powder coated white steel shelves blend in seamlessly with the rest of the electrical chaos behind it, essentially making it appear to be floating off the wall. The white steel brackets paired with the natural walnut color really pops and the warm brown tone really makes a statement against the pure white background.
The wood was sourced from Bonhoff Lumber, 4/4 rough walnut, meticulously picked through by me. I had them mill it down to an inch thick and straight line one side which they did perfectly and made jointing the 9' long and 7' long pieces in my shop much easier. After rough cutting the pieces down to length, trimming off a few knots and damaged pieces with the table saw, I did some final passes with my hand planes to achieve a good glue joint.
Surfaced and rough cut to length. 9' and 7' by about 20"-24" wide.
Glueing up. Using jointed 2X4's and aluminum Ikea legs as cauls :)
After glueing up the three panels, I surface planed them using my No. 6, 5, and 4 hand planes. After some scraping and a lot of sanding, the panels we're perfectly flat on both sides and had some amazing grain. I finished these using Tried & True varnish oil. I'm a big fan of this stuff, it's eco friendly, all-natural, and the results are amazing. But do as they say, apply very thin coats! Even though the work is substantial, it builds with each coat evenly and your left with an amazing finish.
The install went very easy thanks to the great design from Spencer and fantastic metal work by Wyrehaus. I drilled holes using a forstner bit and fit the 9' panel in perfectly. The two 7' sections were more difficult. After measuring a million times and double checking it all again I finally cut my panels to final length and drilled the holes. Then i doweled the middle section together so it wouldn't come apart. With four people we lifted the shelf up, locked it in place and that was it. I put another coat of finish after it was up and wiped it all down.
