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the bug table |
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| I was working in a friend's studio, helping make some displays for a trade show. We made some stands to hold big easels, and they kind of looked like 2-foot long metal bugs. I thought it would be a cool motif for a coffee table, so I set to work... | ||
| The body of the bug is 2 thicknesses of 3/4" 13-ply birch plywood. Laminated to that, is a 1/2" slate slab, which used to be a chalkboard at UCLA (don't ask!). The edges of the slate were hammered into a state of roughness, so it looks a little grubby, like a bug. The plywood edges were clear-coated, to bring up some organic color. | ||
| The body is supported on a spine of 3" Square tube. The six legs are welded to the spine. | ||
| Each leg was 'freestyled' from several sections of progresively-sized round tube. The back legs were made long & thick, and folded underneath, like those of a cricket or grasshopper. All the welds were filled & ground smooth, to look more biological. Each pair of legs is capped by a different-sized ladder foot with rubber treads on the bottom.. The result is three distinct pairs of very buglike legs. | ||
| The steel frame was powder-coated green and the hammered slate edges were sanded a little, so as to look worn instead of broken. It's pretty 'buggy', although some of the effect is lost because the rubber ladder feet are usually buried in the carpet. It weighs about 90 pounds. | ||
| For reasons that aren't quite clear to me (or my wife), I like bugs. Check out the Bug Safari, and the story of Cletus the Bug | ||