Unique Lawn Table

This novel folding lawn table will stand out at any garden party and act as a quant centre piece to your lawn.

What you Need
3 x (660 mm x 220 mm x 40 mm) pine planks
Wood glue
Garden fork with a wooden shaft
16 mm dowel, cut to 600 mm
Wood sealer (we used Rystix Exterior Armadek)
2 strong 100 mm hinges
40 mm cut screws
4 x (100 mm x 40 mm x 20 mm) pine blocks
345 mm x 18 mm x 3 mm piece of scrap wood

Tools
3 long sash clamps
Jigsaw
Tablesaw or circular saw
Sander
Holesaw bit, the same diameter as the fork’s shaft
Drill
16 mm drill bit
Paintbrush
Pencil

What you Do

1. The first step is to glue the three 660 mm x 220 mm x 40 mm pine planks together, to form a 660 mm square. To do this, lay two sash clamps on your table. Apply glue to the long edges of the planks and lay them on the sash clamps. Place a third clamp on top of the board and then tighten all three clamps. Clean off excess glue with a damp cloth and leave to dry.

2. When the glue is dry, remove the board from the clamps and place it on a flat surface. Find the centre of the board by drawing diagonal lines from corner to corner. Where the two lines intersect is the centre.

3. Make a circle guide by nailing the piece of scrap wood (345 mm x 18 mm x 3 mm) to the centre of the board. Put the nail 20 mm from the end of the scrap wood, so that the circle you will draw will have a diameter of 650 mm. Hold the pencil to the other end of the circle guide and rotate the guide around its fixed point to draw a circle. (You can also use a piece of string as a circle guide, attached to a nail.)

4. This is a folding table, so with a table saw or circular saw, cut the board into two halves. Then, using the jigsaw, cut out the two half-circles.

5. Now clamp the two halves together again and drill a hole in the centre with the holesaw.

6. Drill a 16 mm hole in the shaft of the fork, 80 mm below the handle.

7. Place the fork shaft into the hole between the two tabletop half-circles. On the bottom side of the lawn tabletop, glue two of the pine blocks on each half-circle, one on either side of the fork’s shaft. Position the hinges on the wooden blocks and screw them into place. The table will fold at the hinges, and be held in place by the dowel.

8. Insert the dowel into the hole in the shaft, centre it and glue it into place. To fold the table up, spin the tabletop 90° so that the dowel is in line with the cut.