To make the whimsical bee inlay that greets visitors to this New Hampshire home, author Brian Hand transferred the design that he had projected onto a paper onto plywood, cut out the individual pieces with a scroll saw, then reassembled the pieces on a piece of plastic so that he could show the design in full scale to his clients. Arrows marked on the patterns indicate the grain orientation on each wing.
Shown here is the reverse side of the assembled inlay, after the author used the plywood patterns to cut the 36 individual pieces out of decking on a shaper table. Pocket screws join the pieces together.
After removing the existing porch decking, the author added PT blocking for the inlay and covered the blocking and tops of the joists with peel-and-stick membrane. Here, the new decking has been installed with a cutout to accommodate the inlay.
The author face-fastened the assembled bee and the pieces that make up the hive to the blocking, then later filled in the holes with Cortex plugs that matched the color of each individual piece.