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Vanity Unit in Bamboo.

Description.

The task, to design and make a vanity unit to fit below an existing granite top + sink, where the granite top is supported  on 2" steel angle iron. The material  - Bamboo.  Bamboo I hear you say how so? Imagine that  bamboo, normally round and green is reduced to a lot of strips  which are dried, compressed and glued together . The result is an 8' x 4' ( 2.4m x 1,220 m) board . Cost  for a 19mm board  (October  2010) is about £140.00 compared with  a similar sized board of MDF for £40.00 . Not a lot of room for error!

Is it  environmentally sound,  surely you are depriving Pandas of their habitat etc?  Apparently not, and  according to the provider of Bamboo board ( http://www.moso-bamboo.com) it is all  FSC certified. 

Photos above,  and below   left and  right .

Bathroom vanity unit and bath side in Bamboo.

The  angle iron support plus the sink waste pipe and boxing in. The presence of the towel rail  and the supporting angle precluded  a complete unit from simply being  slid into place ( you cannot go in sideways because of the angle support and you cannot go in from the front because of the  the towel rail).

Photo 4 below:

The solution was to construct the unit in 4 discrete pieces. There was to be a small cupboard on the left , a central unit with drawers and another cupboard on the right . Below  (and on the bench) you see the three units standing on a plinth. The plinth is 14mm higher at the r/h end because the floor slopes away from the side wall.

Photos  below:

Close up of the r/h cupboard. The "upstand" on the right is to hide the 2" angle return. The very small section on the top  was a bit tricky to fit.

In the close up of the l/h image there is a small disruption to  the flow of the  grain this  is where the "nodules" occur in the bamboo  ( you know, those bits  where the diameter of the bamboo  briefly increases ). When planning such an edge,  the grain can  sometimes lift  because it seems to be very briefly running all over the place. Is the material  hard to  work you ask?  No and  it is pretty soft ( technically Bamboo is a grass) and can dent very easily.

On the right the l/h unit and the central drawer unit  in close proximity.  What is not  shown is how the insides of the drawers have been fashioned to "go around"  the sink and waste pipe.

Photos  below

Bottom left, The two end cupboards standing on their plinth.  Below right a door  mounted on the l/h cupboard.

Photos; 12 & 13 below  :

Below left, the drawers on full extension runners. The bottom drawer had to be tall enough to accommodate bathroom cleaning bottles .

Below right  the drawer/door pulls. Proprietary pulls were a possibility but something  unique to the project was always going to be better. Early efforts at laminating up the bamboo  board seemed to be going well but,   when turning  up the pulls they were frequently   failing on  a glue line. Although I use a very decent glue (Titebond)  apparently it is not too brilliant with  bamboo. So to an alternative approach....  Having laminated  the bamboo board I drilled a 13mm hole and machined up a bamboo dowel to run through the pull. The dowel  held the laminates together when turning and provide a little more  visual interest.

Below the installation.

Below left,  the plinth is roughly in place and the left hand cupboard is in position. Happily the door cleared the towel rail.  Below right, the central cupboard in position.

Almost there....

Below left, the units screwed together.  Right, the support  angle can be seen within the cupboard. Just enough room for a few loo rolls.

With  apron in place. The customer was very keen to apply  the finish herself and at the time of taking the photograph some 4x coats of Danish Oil had been applied.

 

Below left and right The bath side and end panels also in bamboo held against  a soft wood frame using magnetic catches.

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