It’s often times that woodworking projects come out of necessity. Take this desk for example. As I built my new shop (that doubles as Popular Woodworking’s shop), I built room for an office. After all, my job’s not all fun and games in the shop. After trimming out the office in bur oak, I decided I was going to keep with that theme. And as much as I love shaker design, I couldn’t bring myself to make an oak shaker desk.
With the character and look of this grungy oak, I knew that I really wanted to dive into the Craftsman style. I found a few photos of a Stickley desk in this style and decided to make it my own. What I came up with was a scaled-down version (not nearly as deep), and designed to house all of the tech equipment that I use on a daily basis. Instead of a set of five drawers, my version has two drawers, a keyboard tray, and a large computer cubby with a cut-out for airflow.
Online Extras: See all of the online extras from the June 2025 issue, including a Sketchup model of the desk.
Watch and Learn: Purchase the joinery mastery class from Frank Klausz to learn more classic woodworking joints.
More Craftsman Furniture: Build a classic Craftsman Bookcase
Cutlist and Diagrams
Download: Mission Desk Cutlist and Diagrams
From the Ground Up
For most of my projects, I start with the legs and build up. This desk is no exception. I was pulling really hard to have as much quarter sawn material on this desk as I could. Using quarter-sawn material for legs leaves you with two faces that are plain-sawn. That is not what I desired. So, instead of veneering these legs, I decided the best option was to miter the legs, and build a set of hollow, locked miter legs. This starts off by selecting enough quartersawn stock for four faces, of four legs.
1 Set the bit so that it’s as close to centered on the thickness of the stock as possible.
2 Make test cuts in both orientations.
3 Then cut the tests apart to check the fit on themselves.
If you’ve never used a locking miter bit, here’s a little info. Basically, the bit creates a miter with a tongue and a groove on it. These lock into the mating parts. Two parts of the leg are routed against the fence (photo 4), and the other two are routed laying flat (photo 5). The set up is a bit tedious — requiring a delicate balance of bit height and fence location. A lot of test cuts are necessary, but it’s not difficult to dial in. First, you’ll want to test your set up laying the piece flat. Cut a test, then chop that piece in half, so that you can match the joint to itself (photo 2). If the surface is flush, perfect. If it’s not, adjust the bit and test again. Next, you can cut a test with the part flat up against the fence (photo 4). Do the same thing — cut the test piece apart and check it (photo 3). If the faces are flush, fit your first test together with the second one, and see if it’s a tight miter.
4 Rout two parts of each leg with the faces against the fence.
5 The other parts are laid flat.
Once the set up is dialed in, you can rout your parts. You’re going to rout eight pieces in each orientation, both edges of each. This will yield enough parts to put together four perfectly quartersawn legs. I’m going to point out that I cut this locked miter (and many other parts later on) on my shaper—it’s a tool that’s been around a long time and I think is under utilized in the shop. Keep an eye out for a future article focused on shapers.
6 The locking miter joint creates a groove which is the perfect place to apply a bead of glue.
Now, the legs are glued together. The locked miter is self registering, so you just glue and clamp. You can see this in the photos below. After trimming the end and cutting the legs to final length, you’re left with a square leg with great grain all the way around. I outlined the joint line on one corner in photo 8 below, just so you can see how tight these come out. Of coures—you could chose to not be picky about your stock like I am, and either use 8/4 solid stock, or veneer the faces. I wont shame you for whatever you chose.
7 Because of how this joint sits, clamps are only needed in one direction to pull the entire leg together.
8 With proper setup, the joint is very tight, and creates a clean looking leg. I outlined one of the joints here so you can see how tight they are.
