Dresser Nightstand

Submitted by: John Vasta

Project Description:

Our customer John Vasta is an avid PantoRouter® joinery machine user who’s made some incredible pieces using custom jigs and fixtures. This is his design for a combination dresser/nightstand made to fit a specific space. Sharing frame components is efficient and pleasing to the eye.

The bedroom this set was made for is on the second story of a farmhouse built in the 1890s, with steep stairs with winders, making it necessary for the dresser to be knocked down and assembled upstairs. John used Festool KD hardware and needed to match the mortise size made by the Domino, so he used the slot mortise template shown below. It’s easy to make the mortises for the KD hardware either a snug fit or a bit wider to allow adjustment, and they can be used for horizontal or vertical cuts using our Vertical Template Holder Adapter.

A serendipitous feature of this build is the Knapp joint used for the drawers. The Knapp joint was only used commercially from about 1890 - 1910, so if a new dresser had been purchased for this 1890s farmhouse soon after it was built, there’s a good chance it would have had Knapp joints! Now, 120 years later, it’s once again possible to make Knapp joints with the PantoRouter dedicated joinery machine.