My wife and I have done the Kentucky Bourbon trail a few times. On our first trip I kept noticing a lot of re-purposing of the bourbon barrels, the barrel staves and even the bottles. I’ve always been interested in the ingenuity some people have in making old things look somehow modern.
Such was the case everywhere we went on the trail. (See our article in the travel section for more information about the Kentucky Bourbon Trail).
On that same trip, I saw a rather unique piece of craftsmanship using what I later learned was made from old barn wood. It was a one of a kind bourbon bar. That piece caused me to think about how I’d like to re-create something similar. I’ve always been handy and am by no means an expert craftsman but do consider myself fairly good at woodworking.
So, I took a few photos and thought I’d probably build something similar one day, but I’d first have to find the right materials to keep the bourbon bar as authentic as possible.
I didn’t have to wait too long.
I never knew my father in law. He passed away when my wife was only twenty years old. After he died, my mother in law eventually re-married so my wife’s stepfather became the only father in law I’d ever know. He’s a hardworking guy and loves his two stepdaughters like his own children. He knows he can never replace my wife’s dad, but he gave my wife and her sister another father figure to look up to.
The property in Tennessee where my wife grew up had a few acres and on them was an old barn – the kind you see all over the country with the old faded rusty red paint.
Over the years it had reached such a state of disrepair that it had to be torn down before it collapsed on itself. My father in law decided to do just that and started bringing the old barn down. Unbeknownst to my wife or I, once he had the old barn down, he started burning the old barnwood. Most of it was useless – rotten beyond repair or infested with one insect or another.
I thought what if there was just a small portion of it that was salvageable? My wife and mother in law discussed my idea and once she learned that I was looking for just this type of wood she had my father in law save what he thought was usable. We went to Tennessee and hauled several old boards back home. Some were severely cracked. They had nail holes and were generally in pretty poor shape. But they ended up being just enough for me to build the bourbon bar you see in the illustrations.
I carefully planned each piece of the bourbon bar to make the best use of each board foot of the old wood.
I knew I would not be able to waste a single board, so I was very careful in my measurements and my cuts.
The piece you see has a shelf for open storage and a storage compartment with two doors where we store any extra bourbon that doesn’t fit on the top, some additional glasses and anything else we think appropriate, even some scotch, but don’t tell any bourbon lovers about that The top is recessed tempered glass and can hold probably twenty .75 liter bottles of bourbon. Nothing else is allowed on the top – bourbon only; Our National Spirit. Beneath the recessed glass is a map of the
bourbon trail – a nice little reminder of the fun we’ve had there. It is on casters so we can move it around if we need to. It’s become a very functional piece of furniture in our home and yes it does get a lot of use.
I did have enough old barn wood left to
build a large frame that hangs above the bar and displays some of the photos we took on that first bourbon trail trip.
I also had enough wood left to recreate a very small version of that old barn from a photograph my wife had of her dad standing in front the old barn. I presented it to her for Christmas one year.
Thanks for reading…
Paul
