Bow front vanity? Resources for build?

My one suggestion is to make the curved doors first, then make the cabinet opening to suit the curve you actually achieve with the doors. It's usually easier to work this way around than trying to get the curve of the doors to suit a pre-existing opening. 

I restrict myself to this one piece of advice simply because I've other things I need to get on with immediately. Slainte.

Henry, bow front drawers are really quite straight-forward when the sides are the same. Here is an example ...

https://www.inthewoodshop.com/Furniture/PowerHandTogether5.html

https://www.inthewoodshop.com/Furniture/PowerHandTogether6.html

https://www.inthewoodshop.com/Furniture/PowerHandTogether7.html




Regards from Perth

Derek

I suggest you start with the design problem. When I was making a living at this, I drew a distinction between furniture and real estate. Furniture is something you can pick up and take with you when you move. Real estate includes everything connected to the house itself, including built-ins, kitchen cabinets, bathroom vanities, doors and other miscellaneous woodwork.

The reason I'm suggesting this is that it could affect how ambitious you want to get with your design and execution. As a case in point, I've just begun a curved-front vanity for our master bathroom. I don't want to belabor the construction by making it a tour de force and then marrying it to the house. So, instead of making laminated curved door frames or drawer fronts, I am falling back on a kind of construction that I've done many times for all kinds of curved-front pieces, primarily vanities, that I've made for various dwellings we've lived in. I call it staved construction, using narrow staves to wrap around whatever curve is desired.

Basically, the concept is to design the piece in plan view first, so you can start with the curve you want, to fit the location where the vanity will live. In my current project, in a relatively small bathroom, we needed a vanity that would incorporate: 1) a single (oval) sink in a granite countertop; 2) cabinet space for cleaning products, toilet tissue, etc.; and 3) several drawers for all the things we will use at the vanity, from toothpaste to shaving needs, cosmetics, etc.. The curved front of this vanity was designed to allow easy, graceful access around the cabinet. Here's what I came up with for this particular cabinet...



It's a little fussy, but considerably simpler than a "fine woodworking" approach. Construction consists of a top and bottom, of 3/4" cabinet plywood, with vertical panels establishing the compartments and spacing the top and bottom at the desired height. Then, I'll make the staves and biscuit join them to the top and bottom, and I'll make doors of three staves each, attached to the internal dividers with European hinges. The drawers will be boxes with heavier fronts cut to the cabinet profile, with the staves attached with screws. I've had very favorable results with sliding the drawers on hardwood runners screwed to the insides of the plywood dividers. I usually place the drawer backs a few inches from the rear of the drawer sides (not as drawn here) to provide access to the drawer contents without pulling them all the way out of the cabinet. The staves will have grooves for splines to keep things aligned and close up spaces between them. The edges of the staves will be hand-planed or jointed as necessary to follow the curve. The whole thing is laid out on Masonite, which becomes the full size "drawing" and the router template for the top and bottom, as well as the precise contractual template for the granite top.



You notice how this formula works. Simple construction, use of plywood and Blum hinges, biscuit joinery -- all relatively inexpensive and not involving curved panel techniques or laborious hand tool joinery. You wouldn't make it this way if it were a piece of discrete furniture, depending on the design problem at hand, but it functions perfectly well as built-in cabinetry. I call this woodworking in the service of design. It's been a recurring, guiding theme for me ever since I got started in professional woodworking over fifty years ago.

If anyone is interested, I'll take some more shots as the build progresses.
Ellis


PS, here are a few shots of other vanities I've built using the stave technique. This first one is made of walnut. The door on the right has a two-high lazy susan shelf unit attached, so it swings open with the door. The curve follows the arc of the closing door of the bathroom with enough clearance to keep from pinching fingers.



This one is a little vanity for a tiny powder room. The pull-out drawer is actually a three-high shelf unit. This gives full access to a deep, dead space.


Here's one made of Narra, halfway installed. The drawer fronts were from one stave about 10" wide, taken from a crotch end of a board.

THanks for the ideas and input (so far?).

@ Derek - Thanks, I knew you have the resources on your website, but those direct link are great.  I expect that my build will indeed have a center back of drawers with even sides - and so can incorporate your ideas/methods.  Not certain I will be dovetailing drawers, but we'll see.

@ Richard - thanks, the advice of fitting cabinet to the radius of the curves seems correct.  Kind of like the advice of obtaining your hardware first - before the build.  I have broken that suggestion and have paid the price.  Happy to hear other ideas built on your vast experience with commercial work.

@Ellis - hmm, hadn't even considered staved construction - so wow, that's a new one (to me).  As a solid wood panel did you ever have difficulties with a staved  inset door, or were these all overlay doors?  The overall lines of your last picture - the Narra piece - are what I was generally considering:  a long smooth curve across the face.

Henry

@Henry (Raleigh NC),
The doors on these cabinets were all overlay doors (or half-overlay, in the case of the unit I'm building now). They all have solid wood battens screwed to the back of the door to hold the staves in the correct alignment and precise overall width. It's not the finest woodworking, but it is a reasonable solution to the basic design problems of a vanity.