A birthday was coming up and I decided on making a gift. I know this person enjoys a glass of wine on occasion to take out into their garden with a good book, a puzzle or just to soak up the sun and relax so I thought what better gift than this.

I’d actually seen it somewhere else before and taken note of the basic shape so I drew up a a template in a notepad, took some standard measurements of your average wine bottle (x2) and two types of glasses so the recipient could enjoy wine or even a bottle of bubbly. The engraving was just a little something extra to mark the occasion!

The main body is just pine, it was previously a set of shelves that I no longer needed so waste not want not! I took my templates and began with cutting the basic shapes, sanding rough edges and was able to position most of it in situ, just to get an idea of what it would look like.

I used a jigsaw for the majority of the cuts, a selection of files to form rounder edges such as for stems of the glasses and for the carrier handle. After this it was mostly sanding everything until it seemed enough, squaring it up as best I could and then a little glue and some long screws to ensure it would hold under the weight of two full bottles. I predrilled all the holes just to ensure it went together well and didnt cause any splits.

The finishing touches were to burn it slightly for which I was able to fire up the blow torch, then sanded it back a little and finally gave it a good wax and buff up.

What you can’t see in the images is a later addition of a keyhole cut and brass plate either side. This allowed it to be mounted to a wall so glasses could be removed effortlessly without having to remove them prior to placing it down.

All in all it worked quite well, it’s perfectly functional at least if could do with a little more aging/distressing. It was a fun build, took a few days over a couple of weeks adn I’d probably make another but look for some better qaulity wood to make it from however the pine despite the thickness worked better than a hard wood due to the weight. Perhaps some ash would be better next time. If you would like one of these making for you drop me a line and we can discuss options or alternatively keep an eye on my shop!