Mitre saw bench – Part 11 – Drawer pulls

I recently completed five drawers for additional storage within my mitre saw bench. To open and close them, I decided to make some interesting draw pulls in the form of metal-effect handles out of wood.

I needed to make five drawer pulls for the Mitre saw bench drawers so I decided to use some pine left over from a previous project. I cut the pieces to rough dimensions and then glued the blocks onto the longer pieces. I clamped the pieces to a piece of plywood to hold them in place, drilled a hole through from the top, and glued in a dowel to strengthen the joint.

I left the handles to dry overnight and then used my router to put a roundover on all sides, before hand sanding the edges to leave a smooth finish.

I wanted to try out something I’d see online to create a metal-effect finish using spray paints and figured this was a good opportunity to try it out!

I applied a base coat of a matt silver spray paint, using some scrap cardboard as a backing. I have used spray paint before and always prefer to use it outside due to the strength of the fumes in a small workshop!

Once the silver was dry I then applied a black coat over the top, using some kitchen roll to blot parts of the wet black paint off, to expose the silver underneath. This worked really well and from a distance looks a bit like a worn iron-type handle.

I decided to create a backing plate to go between the handle and the drawer fronts, to add a bit more decoration to the design. I made a template using a decorative design and used that to create five backing plates out of hardboard. I used my scroll saw to carefully cut out the curved sections of the design, which took a bit of time doing five times!

To make the backing plate appear a bit more weathered and realistic, I marked it up with a whole load of dents using a ballpeen hammer. This was incredibly therapeutic, albeit a bit loud!

I then repeated the spray paint process for all five backing plates – applying matt silver and then black over the top, blotting random bits with kitchen roll to expose the silver underneath.

Once the spray paint was fully dry, I clamped the backing plate in place to the drawer front. I drove screws into the handle from the inside using my impact driver, sinking the screws into the drawer body in the previously-drilled countersink holes.

I’m really pleased with how these turned out – the spray paint was a bit of an experiment but it seems to have worked really well, and the black handles stand out nicely against the brown draw fronts. I like the sort of medieval aesthetic they represent, so I shall definitely do more experimenting with future projects! 🔨