"Fineline"

A friend of mine owns a local tattoo studio and asked if I would participate in an art exhibit he was going to have. I had an idea for a tattoo machine based box for a while and thought now would be the time to create it. What you are looking at is the outcome…the “Fineline” box. The spalted maple used in the box represents Mother Natures fine line “tattooing” that we all love.

The tattoo machine legs are made from black walnut, curly maple and stainless steel. They are styled after Micky Sharpz T Dial tattoo machines. The black walnut machine frames have dowel reinforced joints. The birds eye tubes have been drilled from the top and bottom to give the illusion that the stainless steel needle goes all the way through. The birdseye maple coils are turned with a tenon that fits into a hole in the frame and armature bar. They have burned in accent stripes. I made a fixture to sharpen the stainless needles.

The main body is made up of four frame and panel assembles. The frames are made from black walnut. The panels are made up of two pieces of spalted maple with an 1/8” Baltic birch core. The outer portion of the panel is the craziest piece of spalted maple I had. It really soaked up the finish. I made a fixture to carve out the center of the panels to create a more interesting shadow line. There is a false bottom in the main body that creates a secret area under it. You get to the secret are by lifting off the main body from the leg/base assembly.

The lid is made from black walnut, spalted maple, birdseye maple and Ziricote. I wanted the milled pockets in the lid to line up with the panels so it would pull your eyes up to the stylized tattoo machine tube spire. It took two fixtures to create the pockets.

The tray is made from black walnut and spalted maple. The main portion of the tray is box jointed and the divider is held in with small tenons. The divider design was influenced by the Micky Sharpz T Dial.

“Fineline” is 12.125” x 12.125” x 21.5”. It was finished with four soakings of Danish oil and two buffings of wax.

Please contact me if you're interested in purchasing this piece.

"Fineline" was also an award winner.

Price: $3200