Tiki build-along, pt. 24

Rattan-clad aquariums are a modern mainstay in home tiki bars. From what I understand (and this could be wholly off-base), when the tropical fish craze hit big in the 1970s, the metal-framed aquariums and stands corroded due to the salt in the marine tanks. Entrepreneurs in the Philippines, already skilled at working with rattan due to the intricate peacock chairs made there, hit upon the idea of building the aquarium stand entirely out of rattan, designing it in such a way to look like a bamboo hut. The idea caught on, then faded just as quickly when the tropical fish fad subsided. Or something like that.

I've never seen one available new, but used ones turn up on Craig's List around here once every 8-10 months or so. For almost six months someone was trying to sell one in Austin, asking $400 for it. That was far more than I was willing to spend. The thing is, while I kinda wanted one, my tiki bar is outside, so I couldn't keep fish in it. Without climate control, it'd get too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter. So there was no particular urgency for me. Until the other week when a Craig's List ad caught my eye. There were two rattan aquariums for sale, from the same person. Both had elaborate pagoda-style tops, which I'd never seen before. One was a stand-up floor model, the other a table top model. The price was far less than I'd ever seen one listed for before. I couldn't afford it, but this was one of those times where I knew I'd regret it forever if I didn't jump on the deal. So the next day I drove to the west side of San Antonio and picked up the floor model (that's it, to the right). It's in perfect shape. Mint, with the exception of a little dust in crevices. The seller was retired military, who'd gotten them in the 70s when stationed (where else?) in the Philippines. It has never held water, but instead was used to display model cars. Amazing. For now, once I apply a protective coat of spar urethane, the aquarium will display tiki mugs and maybe some fake jellyfish. It's got a nice built-in light, so I plan to rig it up to illuminate nicely. Eventually, we may convert a room in the house to use as an indoor, winter-refuge tiki bar. If that happens, then maybe it will come inside and finally host fish. But for now it's nice where it is.

And where it is, at the moment, is next to my booth. You remember the booth, which I unexpectedly acquired from a closed Fuddrucker's in Houston last September. It was in serious need of tikification. The booth had never been designed to be free-standing, and the boards supporting the back corners were too frail for my plans. One had even broken during the move from Houston to New Braunfels.

The solution, of course, was liberal use of 2x4s. I drilled a pocket hole to screw the 2x4 into the deck, shoring up the existing board on each corner of the three sections.

Then I peeled up the laminate and drilled another screw in to anchor the top end.

Next, I needed to enclose the sides. I measured and cut thin plywood (I forget the exact thickness--less than 1/4 inch) to fit the openings.

Here's the thing--I've learned that storage is at a premium in my tiki bar. Probably all tiki bars, but since mine's outside, there's just not anywhere to keep anything. Since the booth had all that empty space in the back, I decided that rather than simply close it in, I'd make it into cabinets for storage. Those thin doors I'd cut from plywood, I framed them with scrap lumber and furring strips to improve stability and stiffness.

I used shims to position the door properly to mark the hinge locations.

Voila! A door that opens! And closes!

To ensure they stay closed, I installed magnetic latches.

For this next part, you may want to avert your eyes. I made a mistake. A big mistake. Remember how nasty the booth sections were back when I got it? There was grease and grime and food particles all over that I spent a day hosing off and scrubbing down. The bottom most section of the booth had old, black vinyl covering it, and at the time I decided to leave that intact, thinking the vinyl offered some degree of protection to the wood. Wrong! What I failed to take into account was how ripped and damaged that vinyl was, and in fact, it had been catching grease, dirt and--worst of all--moisture and holding it there against the wood. When I finally peeled away that old vinyl months later, I found a disgusting, moldy mess. I'm telling you folks, it was bad. The photos below are the after shots, once I'd hit the fuzzy stuff with multiple waves of Mold Armor and bleach, and exposed it to the cleansing UV rays of the sun. And attacked it with a wire brush. I wasn't playing around, working on this problem off and on for a week. A lot of bleach went into this. A lot of Mold Armor.

The reason I peeled the vinyl away in the first place was to replace it with tiki baseboards. I routed, burned, stained and varnished boards to match the baseboards I'd used along the wall. The booth would match in that aspect, making the Lagoon of Mystery look more like a unified whole as opposed to a random hodge-podge.

The inside sections had two 45 degree turns, so to make the baseboards fit properly, I made 22 degree cuts to the ends (22 and 22 don't equal 45, but it's close enough).

The fit was, again, close to perfect. The baseboards are attached with countersunk outdoor-rated screws. The grey screw heads are disguised with a dab of brown paint, applied with a Q-tip. This is a high-tech operation here, after all.

Next, it was time to tackle the exterior (ie, back) of the booth. The door and lower area had to be addressed separately, otherwise the door couldn't open, could it?

I had a lot of tortoise shell bamboo tambour paneling left over from the wall of the tiki bar, so I selected appropriately-sized strips of scrap, cut to size, then attached to the side of the booth using a combination of paneling nails and Titebond II glue. I've stressed this many times, but it bears repeating--always drill pilot holes first when nailing bamboo. If you don't, it will split. Heck, it might split even if you do. But the nails held it solidly in place until the glue dried.

The door, being larger and more unwieldy, proved a bigger challenge. I had to cobble together several pieces of tambour paneling, then measured out the proper length.

The best way to cut the tambour (that I know of) is to roll it tightly then used a fine-toothed trim saw. I use my band saw when I can, but these pieces were too big to fit. Old-fashioned elbow grease was necessary to get the job done.

Again with the glue. The plywood of the door is too thin for nails, so the glue's going to do a lot of work here.

I drilled pilot holes for nails into the plywood backed by the furring strips and scrap wood. The paneling nails are mostly to hold the tambour in place until the glue dries.

Here's something I don't see mentioned online about bamboo tambour--it bows outward. I had to go through my wall covering and add a bunch of nails because the tambour started sagging badly. It looked like a pot belly sticking out. To prevent that from happening on the cabinet doors, I rigged up this scaffolding of boards and clamps to press the center strip of tambour tight against the door until the glue set. If you think it looks inelegant, trust me, it's far more clumsy in reality. It did not get easier with each subsequent door.

Finally, I added a smaller routed trim piece to the top and bottom of the door to act as both a door stop (keeping it from going in too far) and providing a de facto handle to grab onto when opening the cabinet. This proved challenging to position correctly. Again, the trim pieces are attached to the door via countersunk outdoor screws drilled into the scrap frame on the opposite side of the door. I also ended up painting the plywood edges of the booth black so they'd blend better with the black laminate and dark trim. You'd be amazed at just how much a tan strip of exposed plywood stands out and draws the eye.

By repeating that routed triangular motif, I've managed to match the booth to both the walls and the pedestal cocktail tables I built last year. This particular table is larger than the others, as I made it to spec once I obtained the booth.

I think it looks pretty snazzy. Someday, I may do something with that white stripe running through the middle of the seats. And someday we may just re-upholster the seating entirely with a tapa pattern or some such design that's appropriately tiki. But for now, I'm happy with what I've accomplished. Even so, there's plenty more work to be done!

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