PART 3
The interior in comparison to many of our whisky boxes appears quite simple with only a tray to hold four bottles of whisky and a drawer for two booklets but of course nothing is ever as simple as it appears. The tray needs to rotate through 90 degrees and be held at that point so that the whisky corks are moistened to retain an airtight seal. You should not store whisky flat as permanent interaction between the whisky and cork is detrimental to the whisky. We designed a simple flap system that holds the tray in the right position and is then released with a simple push of the hand.
The two doors have deep recesses to accommodate a temperature and humidity gauge, which are set into leather covered panels. These are inset from the door sides to allow a through put of air the gauge mechanisms.
There is no space in the box for the drawer to have protruding handles so we designed a flush fitting rotating brass handle that operates by pushing the brass inwards so that the handle rotates around a pivot point.
The bottles and books and fitted into suede covered high density foam, which grips the items firmly and a leather covered panel goes over the top. The bottles are held in by leather straps and a second strap goes behind the bottle neck to facilitate easier removal.
Once the woodwork is completed there is just the polishing. but in this case a high gloss finish was required so the whole box is sprayed with isolator before having four coats of polyester and then hand burnished to a glorious sheen.
PART 4
The walnut box is simpler in many ways but still has a level of complexity with a requirement for sapwood to run up each corner reducing the amount of veneer available for selection. The veneer runs vertically up the box and folds over the top forming triangles that meet at the centre. The closing faces of the lid and box have similar quartered patterns.
The box is formed in a similar way to the previous box with solid timber inset into the panels providing a solid lipping after the top is cut off.
A set of fine quality box hinges, corners and a brass hinge compliment the specially engraved brass plates that are recessed into the top surface and inside the lid.
The box core is black mdf to emphasis the laser etched logo on the front and the finish is semi-matt polyurethane lacquer.
It was great fun making the boxes made much easier by the facilities, resources and equipment that we now have at our disposal. I remember the early days when things were rather more rudimentary and I wonder what the current craftspeople would say if we asked them to use only what I had thirty-seven years ago!