Free Plan: Mission Plate Rack

Forty-eight inches of oak, two plate rails, doweled joints — a 1912 dining room piece built over a few shop days.

Free download. No signup required.

  • Full PDF plan
  • Cut list & dimensions
  • 14 steps incl. wall mounting
Wall mounted Mission style plate rack in pale unstained oak, forty-eight inches wide, four posts with beveled tops, two plate rails holding upright plates and four small side shelves

Plates behind glass look like a museum. Plates on a rack look like somebody lives there.

This plan comes from Mission Furniture, How To Make It, Part 3, published by Popular Mechanics in 1912 and long out of copyright. Forty-eight inches wide, four posts with beveled tops, a top board, two plate rails, four small shelves, and back boards that lap over the sides. The joinery is dowels throughout — posts to side and back boards, posts to plate rails — with one mortised detail: the raised plate rests let into the side pieces above the rails. Nothing here needs a full mortise-and-tenon skill set, but it does want a doweling jig and a mortising chisel, not just a drill and a hammer.

Which means the build runs three to four shop days with a doweling jig, a mortising chisel and a saw. Two things still decide how it turns out, and only one of them is woodworking: the direction the boards overlap, and what is behind the wall you hang it on.

Project at a Glance

Difficulty
Intermediate
Main materials
Oak, dowels, wood glue, wall screws, finish
Build time
Three to four shop days, plus finish
Tools needed
Miter saw, doweling jig and drill, 7/8-inch groove cutter or router, mortising chisel, clamps, level, sandpaper
Joinery
Doweled construction, with one mortised detail at the plate rests
Safety
Wall-hung and loaded with dishes — see the note below before you hang it
Source
Popular Mechanics Handbooks, 1912 (public domain)

Before you assemble:

Mark the overlap before the glue is open. The back boards go over the side boards, not the other way around — it puts the load path into one plane instead of relying on the doweled edge alone, and it is the way the piece reads correctly from the front. At the bench, with parts in your hands and everything looking symmetrical, it is a coin toss. A pencil mark on the inside face settles it. Same for the plate grooves: cut them while the rails are still loose and flat, not after the frame is together.

Here is what this project quietly proves. A doweling jig, a mortising chisel, the ordinary saw and drill — that is a whole piece of display furniture, out of a shop that fits in a corner.

Most people who feel stuck do not need a bigger machine. They need one more finished piece behind them and a clear idea of what to build next. That second part is where a lot of weekends get lost: not building, but scrolling for something worth building.

What one of the plans looks like

One plan, front to back

Every plan in the library comes with the same three things: a cut list you can total before the lumber run, measurements on every part so nothing gets scaled off a photo, and step-by-step instructions from rough stock to finish. That is the layer this plate rack plan gave you, sixteen thousand more times.

The library covers furniture, shop jigs, outdoor builds and small projects, beginner to advanced. It works with a few hand tools or a full shop, and you keep it for good.

See what's inside Ted's library →

Disclosure: Some links on this page are affiliate links. If you buy through them, I may earn a commission at no additional cost to you.

Also worth a look: the technique layer

Woodworking Secrets is a printed book on layout, cutting, joinery and finishing, the part a plan leaves out. The publisher sends it at no charge and you cover the shipping. It ships to US addresses. On the order page there is a box for a trial membership that is already ticked — untick it if you only want the book.

See the book →