Wood Floor of the Week: Parquet Comes Off the Floor … and Onto a Table

Chuck Crispin of Legendary Floors of Florida LLC in West Palm Beach, Fla., is known for his many award-winning wood floors, usually featuring designs based on classic parquets or log rounds. During the pandemic, though, he’s bringing some of his flooring designs up off the floor and showing off some serious furniture skills.

One of Crispin’s winning flooring projects involved a parquet based on an Antoinette pattern that was installed in the Clive Christian showroom in the Merchandise Mart in Chicago in 2008. The approval sample from that floor was in Crispin’s Florida showroom, and it caught a customer’s eye, but not for a floor.

“After seeing the parquet in my showroom, a local Palm Beach customer requested converting it to a round coffee table so her rambunctious grandchildren could play safely in her large living room,” Crispin says. He gladly obliged, using square parquets of walnut, pumajiero (Peruvian gold), and wenge measuring ¾ by 52 by 52 inches.

He used his Festool plunge router attached to a swing arm to cut the circular shape, then added segmented radial nosings created by curly walnut blanks he purchased as slabs. The rest of the process, as he explains it:

“The nosings were made in two lengths so the joints would align on center where the ribbon pattern terminate, accented by a 5/16-inch-wide-by-⅜-inch-thick wenge feature. The nosings were glued and screwed to a secondary ¾-inch-thick plywood base using Bostik's Best adhesive. The screws were removed once the adhesive had set overnight, then the channel for feature strip was routed in, the soft ogee edge detail was created freehand using a bottom bearing router bit, and the pre-scraped radial feature was installed. Hand-cut and irregularly shaped dowels turned on a belt sander were used to make wenge pegs installed in the screw holes, so no metal remains in the table.

“The octagonal skirt beneath the table was crafted from ¾-inch-thick-by-21/4-inch-tall curly walnut cut in two lengths to align with the surface pattern. The skirt was installed attached to a ¾-inch-thick-by-11/2-inch-wide cleat using glue and Spax screws, which were later removed and pegged.

“The eight legs were made using two pieces of walnut measuring ¾ by 31/4 inch tapered to 2 inches with a solid, slightly wider 5/16-inch-thick feature of wenge. The head of the legs was mortised on two angles by hand using a Japanese saw, a Fein tool and chisel to snugly fit over the skirt at the intersection of the 221/2-degree miter joints. Screws were removed once the Gorilla glue adhesive set, and wenge pegs were used to fill the holes.

“The curly walnut presented a bit of a challenge for scraping. Pieces often had to be worked from different directions to tame the ‘chatter,’ but the soft texture created by re-scraping the entire piece once it was assembled is inviting to touch and elegant to behold.

“Once scraped, my young protégé Elizabeth Barclays-Harmon and I finished the table using our proprietary English Toffee color formula and seven or eight coats of Sutherland Wells, DuraSeal, and Watco Danish oil, in varying combinations, burnished using 00 steel wool to achieve a warm patina and glowing luster. Under the right light, the curly walnut fairly shimmers like a pond touched by a velvet breeze!”

See more projects from Chuck Crispin:

Jurassic Jazz: This Wood Floor Demands a Second Look ... and More

Brazilian Cherry, Wenge and Granite Form a Fabulous Foyer

Log Rounds Make a Gorgeous Lake Placid Floor

Radial Design Elements Set Off Versailles Parquet

Creating this 'Perch' Floor Was like Birthing a Baby

Not Your Normal Versailles Parquet: Leather & Reclaimed White Oak

Purposely Distorted Starburst Highlights Phenomenal Showroom

Biedermeier-Style Furniture Inspires Starburst Floor