A woodcarving project I started as a gift for my brother. He's a big gaming fan and one of his favorite games is Risk, so I decided to 'make' him a Risk inspired (world map) table. After a good 2 months of drilling, dremeling and sanding, this was the result.

Materials:
- Table (I found mine in a second hand store for 40 dollars)
- Painters tape/ electrical tape (or any other tape you have at home, just make sure it doesn't leave to much stickiness when you peel it off)
- Paper (to print your world map on)
- Spray glue
- Boat varnish (15 dollars, but I could make a other 10 tables with it)

Tools:
- Computer & printer
- Precision cutter
- Dremel tool with different routing bits (although I would recommend using a router tool, I used a dremel because I don't own a router but it could spare you a lot of time)
- Wood grater
- Sanding tool (you could do it by hand, but an electric tool makes everything a lot easier)
- Chisel
- Woodburning tool
- Paint brush

Step 1: Searching and Printing the World Map

I searched and printed my world map. Using the website www.blockposters.com, I enlarged the image to make it fit the table.

Step 2: Glueing, Taping and Cutting

After finding my table at the second hand store, I moved it to the living room (as I don't really have another place to do my crafting projects)

I used painters tape and electrical tape to outline the decorational lines on the side of the table

I glued the world map on the tabletop using the spray glue (the instructions told me to only spray it on the paper for a non permanent stick, ideal since I want it to come off easily). I spread the continents a little more than I had to, to cover more of the tabletop.

Armed with my precision knife, I cut out all the continents and leave the oceans uncovered.

Step 3: Dremeling, Dremeling, Dremeling

I used a diamond bit to do the fine outlining of the continents and a bigger router bit to 'carve' the oceans. The table I bought was cover in a dark brown lacquer, so all I did was scraping the top layer off. I took me an awfull lot of time to do so, but with a lot of patience and especially a lot of dust (the resemblance with the Sahara desert was uncanny) I finished the nerve-racking job. Luckily, the result was satisfiying.
I recommend using a real router tool to make this step more efficient.

Step 4: Grating and Sanding

Because of the small dremel bits and my unsteady hand, there were a lot of dents in the wood, therefore I used a hand grate to plane it all out. After that, I used a sanding tool to sand it smooth

Step 5: Last Decorational Steps

Searching the interwebs, I used the design of a compass rose and then used the design of Ardbeg whisky and changed it a little (the letter 'A' to 'W', the first letter of my brothers name, Ardbeg is his favorite whisky).
I then used a chisel to carve a little name tag out and used a woodburning tool to put my name on the piece

Step 6: The Finishing Touch

As the table is to be used as a gaming table (and everyone knows, strategic warfare always improves with a good beer) I decided to finish the table with a waterproof boat varnish, which gives it a shiny gloss and can withstand a scratch.
Let the game begin!

Participated in the
Reclaimed Wood Contest 2016

Participated in the
First Time Author Contest 2016

5 Comments

EllenR3

7 years ago

Nice one! I actually did a table top project on a table with the same shape. Gotta love those oval tables. I am thinking about doing another tabl with some kind of map on it, so was really interested in your instructable.

What a lot of work though! I wonder if one could achieve a similar effect by covering the "world" parts and then applying stron paint stripper to the rest of the surface. Well fo course then you do not get that nice structured background.