The Method For Creating A One-Of-A-Kind Wooden Box In No Time

From packages to cereal, most people are familiar with what boxes look like and how they are constructed. These six-sided polyhedrons are a pretty straightforward concept and a woodworking project even beginners can do. The pieces are simple — four sides, a bottom face, and a top face — but there are plenty of different ways to fit them together. This method is among the quickest and coolest.

Using pieces of light and dark wood, two strips of masking tape, a bottle of glue, a couple clamps, and sandpaper, YouTuber BStarCrafts1 crafts a beautiful two-tone box in what appears to be no time at all. The project also uses a table saw, which is one of the tools worth investing in if you want to start woodworking at home, and a router. The lid fits perfectly because it is cut from the completed box and not constructed separately. The process of cutting the lid is not new or revolutionary, but the tape and glue method is a nifty trick that you should definitely add to your arsenal.

After angling the long edges of all four box sides with 45-degree cuts (eight in total), the woodworker lines them up and places two strips of tape sticky side up on their workbench. The pieces are placed face down on the tape with a piece of scrap wood used to align the bottom edges, and glue is applied generously to the angled edges. The glue is not unique to this method, but knowing when and how to use wood glue is very important. When one side of the masking tape hammock is lifted, the sides come together to form miter joints.

Not only does the simple tape trick look cool, but it saves precious woodworking time. It's also great for builders with limited dexterity who may have trouble balancing four to six pieces of wood at the same time during a glue-up. The trick would not work with non-angled corners or complex joinery, and it would be less effective in large box projects because the pieces would be too heavy to lift with the tape.

After adding on the final two sides of the box, the woodworker uses a router to round out the corners and finishes off with a simple cut all the way around to create a lid. It's an incredibly easy DIY — perfect if you need a quick gift or are looking for a simple project.

While this box making method is great for making a unique and attractive gift or storage box, parts of the process can also be used to speed up those DIY projects that require bulk production. For example, if you're making keepsakes for a birthday party or as wedding favors and want to create small personalized boxes, having a tape hammock assembly line would make the repetitive work go by faster. Need to make a cube storage cubby system for craft supplies? A dozen sliding trays could be glued at once, sanded, and painted as a batch.

Similarly, this method is perfect for hobbies like model making and miniature building. The kind of tape would depend on the material being used as some adhesives will damage paper or painted surfaces, and, of course, the glue would also depend on the application, but the newly acquired skill is universal. You'll just need to think outside of the — you guessed it — box.