• Menu
  • Skip to right header navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary navigation
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Before Header

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Turning for Profit | Woodturning | Lathe |

Helping woodturners make more money

  • Blog
  • Projects
    • Library
      • Turned Bowls
      • Christmas Projects
  • Inspiration
  • Make Money
  • Woodturning Techniques
  • Workshop Expertise
    • Splinters
  • Shop
  • Blog
  • Projects
    • Library
      • Turned Bowls
      • Christmas Projects
  • Inspiration
  • Make Money
  • Woodturning Techniques
  • Workshop Expertise
    • Splinters
  • Shop
You are here: Home / Projects / Heart Vase: A Turning Project
Mothers Day Gifts - Heart Shaped Vase

Heart Vase: A Turning Project

By //  by Robin 8 Comments

divider
This post contains affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something we may earn a commission. Thanks.

Heart Vase: A Turning Project

A heart vase makes a great gift for Valentine’s Day. The trick to this vase is the heart shape turned on a thinner piece of wood. Because you do not turn the entire blank round you have the indentation for the heart at the top of the vase. To emphasize the dip in the center of the heart you can carve the top just like I did.

heart vase pin

Now you and I might both call this vase a weed pot. That is what turners call a small vase to hold dried flowers or grasses. However, when I did my key word research you can guess what “weed pot” turned up on Google. Well you can call it a weed pot but for this post I’ll have to use “heart vase”.

General Product Ideas

A heart shape will make the vase special. So like most weed pots, this vase is perfect for young children to use for picked wildflowers for Mom. This heart vase is a bit rustic in its character and would be suitable for an outdoor situation like a back patio or the cottage / camper. Of course anyone can use the vase to give flowers to their sweetheart.

If you are selling turned goods at the Farmers’ Market then this might be a lower price point for your booth. I would pick local “weeds” for your display at the market. Do not pick rare or endangered plants for your display; that would give the wrong impression!

Design Considerations

I will be turning a 1” diameter hole in the center, 3” in depth. This will accommodate a stainless steel insert that would allow you to put the flowers in water. You don’t have to do this. Drill a hole that is appropriate to the size of wood you are turning. If you don’t add the insert then the vase will still be suitable for dried flowers. The addition of the insert could give you two price points for the same product.

Adding an insert with water will make the vase a bit heavier which will give it more stability. However the base that is being turned is still quite narrow. Another design option would be to turn a 1” tenon on the bottom of the vase and glue that into a turned base which would be round and give much more stability to the vase. You could also use contrasting wood for the bottom which will up the value of your work.

The tip of the heart can be altered based on your turning preferences. A rough and ready heart vase should be moderately thick at the base. My vase is about 3/4″ in diameter and the vase feels quite stable. If you were turning for a show you could have a very thin point and dried flowers to make a very stunning presentation.

The shape of the heart is also up to you. There is no standardized shape for a heart. So tall and thin, short and wide, or somewhere in between, the choice is yours.

To see if this project would work I turned a sample heart vase in fir. The blank was 1.5” thick. The result turned out okay so I prepared a birch blank for the actual project. The challenge with the thinner vase was that the end would wiggle in the jaws of the chuck as it was held with only two jaws. I stabilized it by using the tail stock and drill bit to keep the vase steady. The heart shape was obvious but more care was needed in turning the blank.

heart vase sample run

Turning Process

For this project you are going to turn a rectangular blank. This means that you will be turning air all the time. Any quick movements can result in a catch as there is not always wood present to rub the bevel on. You need to be slow and steady to get a good cut and finish on your vase. Don’t rush the tool on this one.

I used a spindle gouge to do the rough turning and the shaping for the top of the heart.  Along the body of the vase I used a skew chisel taking very light cuts to get as smooth a finish as I could.

Preparation of blank

Prepare your blank to suitable dimensions. My blank was 2.5” thick, 3” wide, and about 7” long. To make the vase look good you need to be in the exact center of your blank. For me I needed a point that was 1 1/4″ in from each side. Because of the way we are shaping the heart vase any variance between the two sides will be obvious. A little bit of extra care here will greatly improve your finished product.

heart vase blank

Turning blank round

Insert the blank between centers based on your marks.

heart vase initial rounding

Practice your cuts here, when you are just rounding out the general shape. This gives you practice cutting “air”.

Cut a Tenon on the Blank

Use a parting tool to cut a tenon on the base of the heart vase. This will hold the vase in a multi-jawed chuck so that you will be able to shape the top.

heart vase tenon turned

This is where you need to be very careful. A thicker vase gives you more support on the tenon by having more contact with the jaws of the chuck. A thinner vase can move around as there is less contact with the chuck jaws.

heart vase in multi chuck

Marking and design choices

At this point I mark out the waste wood at the bottom of the vase, the base of the vase, and the body of the vase. This gives me a spatial idea of how everything will fit together.

heart vase layout marking

Shaping the heart vase body

Use the tail stock to give you extra support. Now you can shape the base and body of the vase.

heart vase base and body shaping

Drilling the center hole

I used a 1” forstner bit to make the center hole. I drilled into the vase as far as I could reach. Then I shaped the heart shape top of the vase.

heart vase initial drilling

I had a challenge turning the top of the vase and kept catching the edge of my spindle gouge. I finally managed to get a top that I was pleased with. At this point I re drilled the center hole to make it 3” deep.

heart vase final drilling

You can see that there is not much (if any) indentation at the top of the vase.  This is because my wood was too thick.  A narrower piece of wood (see image below) would show more of the heart shape.

Emphasize the Heart Shape

I used a carving knife to shape the center part of the heart.

The thinner the vase the more the heart shape stands out.

heart vase two thicknesses

Finishing and sanding as appropriate

The sanding process is a bit more complicated. As the vase turns you are completely missing its flat side. Not only that but it is hard to have the sand paper in place to sand the round part as well as you hand is bouncing as the vase turns. You need to sand with each grit in turn both with the lathe on and the lathe off. Even the section you think you have sanded when the lathe is on needs to be sanded again with the lathe off.

If you apply a wax finish, like I did, then you need to apply the wax in the same way.

Production options

To improve the process of turning the vases you could try:

  • Adding a jig to your jaws to give you extra support
  • Turning the project in the round then cutting off the edges with a band saw. You will want a jig to help stabilize the cutting of the vase.
  • Turning a tenon on the vase and insert it into a base that is turned separately
  • Using an orbital sander to make the hand sanding part of the process go faster
  • Turning softer woods, like dimensioned lumber, but painting the finished product

Marketing ideas

Weed pots, or this heart vase, are good products for your inventory. It can be simple to turn and finished quite simply. As a result you can have a low to mid-range priced product for your booth.

You can also embellish the vases to increase their value. Use two different woods, one for the base and the other for the vase. Use a close grained hardwood for the vase and a glossy finish as well. Depending on how you produce them these would be suitable for a farmers market or a gallery show. Be creative and enjoy the process.

heart vase title

Back to you!

I hope you have enjoyed this project. It is posted just before February 14th, Valentine’s day. With a few days left you could turn a heart vase for your sweetie. For the rest of the year you can turn weed pots in the shape of hearts and have more products in your inventory. Let me know how your vase turns out.

I encourage you to sign up for my newsletter (see side bar) and follow me on Facebook. Every day I post at least one turning project. See you later.

Save

Filed Under: Projects, Technique Tagged With: frugal wood turning, small turnings, turning tips, wood turning projects

Related Posts:

You may also be interested in these posts:
Handmade with Care Stamp

7 Gifts for Men Made on the Lathe

Christmas Projects Title

Christmas Ornaments: Build Your Inventory Fast

Finished Niddy Noddy with yarn.

Niddy Noddy – A Woodturning Project

Turning Blanks: How to cut dimensional lumber on your table saw to make turning blanks

Turning Blanks from your Table Saw

Wooden Kitchen Trivets are easy to turn and love to use.

Wood Trivet – A kitchen turning project

This cup holder extension will help you hold larger coffee cups in your car

Cup Holder Extension

Previous Post: « Trade Show items needed displayed on a table Trade Show Checklist
Next Post: Book Review “Design the Life you Love” by Ayse Birsel Design the Life You Love »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Chris

    February 10, 2016 at 8:32 pm

    I was wondering if you could make the centre hole the size to fit a pill bottle or a film canister so that you could put live flowers in it instead of just dried flowers? What do you think? Would that work? Or be too complicated?

    Reply
    • Robindl

      February 10, 2016 at 9:25 pm

      That is a great idea. Thank you.

      I turned the hole in my heart vase a 1″ diameter to fit a stainless steel insert available from Lee Valley in Canada. A narrow container like a pill bottle or a film canister would also work. You can drill the hole any size you want. I would recommend using a blank that is at least a quarter inch or more wider so you have at least an eighth of an inch for the wall thickness.

      Reply
    • Jim

      January 29, 2022 at 4:54 am

      I buy 1″ clear acrylic tubes from eBay to use as inserts for bud vases. They would work. Tip: turn your case and bore the hole for the insert then leave for a fortnight before putting the tube in. This lets the wood settle and dry. Sometimes the hole deforms and needs drilled out again. I’ve had tubes crack because I put them in too soon.

      Reply
  2. Steve

    January 26, 2019 at 5:42 am

    I have recently made some vases and used large test tubes to line them. The tubes were readily available on EBay and Amazon and you can get a variety of sizes. I used a forstner bit with an extension to drill 6″ into the vases and it really turned out well. The tubes I used were 6″ long and 1″ diameter. You can use these to make a single stem vase with a red rose especially for valentines day.

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. 7 Mothers Day Gifts You Can Turn - Turning for Profit says:
    April 18, 2016 at 11:42 pm

    […] Heart Shaped Vase […]

    Reply
  2. 5 Wood Turning Projects for the Garden - Turning for Profit says:
    January 25, 2017 at 5:44 pm

    […] Turning a Heart Shaped Vase.  The trick to this vase is to turn a narrow piece of wood rather than the typical square turning blank.  This gives you two challenges.  You need to be very precise to get the vase centered on your lathe.  Because the vase is rectangular any off center positioning will be very obvious beside the hole for the flowers.  The second challenge is turning air.  As you can see in the vase above you are only cutting on the edge of the turning blank, not all the way around.  So take your time to make the cuts and take fine cuts.  You’ll get an awesome result. […]

    Reply
  3. Cremation Urn - A Woodturning Project | Turning for Profit says:
    February 20, 2018 at 10:53 am

    […] Well this turned out to be my biggest challenge.  I do not have any specialized hollowing tools.  Bowl gouge and scraper were my options.  To make this work easier I fitted a 1” forstner bit into my tail stock.  Since this was my big lathe I had a greater reach into the base.  I was able to make a hole to the depth that I wanted.  This will give me something to aim for.  This is the same method that I used to drill out the heart vase garden project. […]

    Reply
  4. Ring Holder - A Woodturning Project - Turningforprofit.com says:
    February 27, 2018 at 11:01 am

    […] ladies, of all ages, also like flowers.  You can turn a weed pot for dried flowers and there is a heart shaped vase that looks good as well.  There are more turning projects here that you can consider as […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

CAPTCHA
Refresh

*

Primary Sidebar

Welcome

About me:

Welcome to the Turning For Profit Community! I'm Robin. Turning for Profit is about helping you find hope and joy in your woodturning hobby. It's about projects that fill your inventory and inspire your creativity. It's business help to get you set up and making a profit quickly. If you've always wanted to work from home playing with wood, let me help you realize your dream of Turning for Profit. Read More…

Help for Beginner Woodturners

Learn to use 5 different wood turning tools, with confidence, while you turn 7 projects, building your wood turning skills sequentially.  Includes tips and ideas for marketing your wood turning, when you are ready to move forward.


Footer

Inspiration:

You don’t have to be good to start.  You just have to START to be good. — Joe Sabah

Handmade with Care Stamp

7 Gifts for Men Made on the Lathe

7 Gifts for Men Made on the Lathe
Christmas Projects Title

Christmas Ornaments: Build Your Inventory Fast

Christmas Ornaments: Build Your Inventory Fast
Finished Niddy Noddy with yarn.

Niddy Noddy – A Woodturning Project

Niddy Noddy – A Woodturning Project
  • Start Here
  • About me
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms and Conditions
  • Disclosure

Site Footer

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Copyright © 2023 · Mai Lifestyle Pro On Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in