A while ago I was contacted by another YouTube channel to ask if I’d be interested in a collaboration. That channel is Vat19 and, among other things, they make a series of videos called “Let’s Play” where they play one of the board games they sell on their site. They thought it would be interesting if I made a custom trophy to use in the show.

We talked a bit about the design, and it was decided that the trophy would be the traditional cup shape. To make it a bit more unique, I used two types of wood – maple and sapele. I also added a sapele ring near the top with the words: “Vat19 Lets Play” cut in. As shown in the build video, that ring of letters was the most challenging part of the project:

The video pretty much shows all the details, but I thought I’d highlight the simple method I used to keep the blocks in line while I clamped them. These are just scraps of wood with a “V” cut in:

With these simple guides, I can clamp the blocks tightly together without having them sliding around:

The turning itself was not complex – I didn’t go overboard with fancy details, just some basic coves to define the shape. I did all of my turning with regular woodworking chisels, some of which I’ve ground to special profiles. Although not generally recommended, it is the way I learned to turn and I’ve never had any problems or bad things happen:

With the ring glued in, I used small needle files to clean up the letters that I cut out by hand with a coping saw. Another method, and actually the way I was originally going to do this, would be to cut out individual letters and glue those on top of the base. Then glue the upper ring above.
In the end, I think this resulted in a much cleaner appearance:

The trophy didn’t quite look impressive enough with just the cup, so I made a two part base to beef it up some. Again, I used two types of wood and cut the sapele block with facets to make it more interesting.
I sprayed on three coats of clear satin finish, sanding between coats to highlight the grain and protect the wood:

And finally, here’s the Let’s Play video from Vat19 that features the trophy: