Friday 14 September 2007

Ruler storage and cutting table come light box

Just thought I'd share this nifty little ruler storage idea I had. It's a plate drainer I picked up from T K Max (T J Max in the USA) but I'm sure if you keep your eyes open you could find a similar one. It had drainer written large across the front but a quick go with a sharpie pencil soon got rid of that.
And this is my cutting table. It's all from Ikea. Two of their wooden trestles (a friend tried the metal ones but they are a little wobbly for our purposes) with one of their strengthened glass table tops. I have two cutting mats on it, One is 23" X 35" and I have that sideways on at one end, it overlaps a little as the table top is 31½" wide. And then length ways on I have a 24" X 36" .

The height is adjustable but not something you can do without a helper as the glass is very heavy. I have mine set at the highest.
Then when I want a light box I remove the cutting mat and place a spot light with a low energy bulb underneath. Low energy bulbs are good because they don't generate much heat so there is less risk of fire. I tend to use the 23watt ones which give off the equivalent of 150watt of light. I generally just prop it on one of the sewing machines stored underneath but you could use a clip on one on a trestle.
I use masking tape to stop the design I'm tracing from moving about and with a small quilt I would use masking tape to hold the fabric in place. For a large quilt I use these clips which are made to hold tablecloths down outside in summer (are there really people on the same planet as me who use tablecloths in the garden?).
Pegs work as well as the glass isn't too thick.

Should Ikea give me commission? (grin)

4 comments:

  1. Thats a very neat trick using glass for the table top so it doubles up as a light box and of course wipes fown dead easy too

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  2. I used a record (LP) rack for colored glass when I was doing stained glass. Same idea different problems. But what the hea, we are "Mothers of Inventions".
    Love your site.

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  3. And not a piece of fabric in site!!!

    Oh, and I can learn Swedish while I'm here - the HTML tags read
    "Sie können HTML-Tags verwenden"!! What is happening to Blogger????

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