Nobody Has Ever Built This As Their First Woodworking Project

May 28, 2025 · 42 min · 409 views

My first real woodworking project was a full-size door for our home. It's plywood panels glued together, wrapped in a frame I also built, with LED channels routed into the face, a glowing handle, and a QuinLED-Dig-Quad board running WLED behind it all. The electronics and the power supply live in a 3D-printed enclosure I found on Thingiverse.

It's the kind of thing a reasonable person builds after a few years of practice. For me it was project number one.

Why a door

We needed a door, and I'd wanted to start woodworking for a long time. So I did both at once. Somewhere around the glue-up stage, the nerd in me asked: what if the door had LEDs? From then on, the lights were part of the plan, and there was no going back.

What went wrong

Almost everything, at least once. I had to research what wood to even buy, then buy my first tools, then learn how to use them on the piece I actually cared about. Building the frame, fitting it into the wall, making door stops, making a handle: each of those was a first. The chapters of the video are more or less a list of the things I didn't know how to do yet. Routing the LED channels meant learning the router on the real piece.

My fix for most of these problems was wood filler. A lot of wood filler. Then sanding, then paint, then more filler where the sanding revealed new sins. I swore a whole lot, and I came very close to giving up more than once. There's even a chapter called the dark side of the door. I'll let you discover that one.

The moment I became a maker

Woodworking, obviously: cutting plywood straight, gluing panels, building and installing a frame, routing, and the humbling amount of sanding that comes after. LEDs: wiring addressable strips, running them from a QuinLED-Dig-Quad, and configuring everything in WLED. Painting: a door and the wall around it. And mostly problem-solving. Every step had a surprise, and I had to stay calm enough to find a workaround instead of walking away.

I think the moment I became a maker was the very last thing I did: 3D printing a new diffuser for the LED handle. The door was finished, and I still couldn't leave it alone.

Watch it

Watch the full build on YouTube.

Gear and links

Woodworking and DIY YouTubers I learned from:

Tools and gear I used: