Custom Boxes: Design through Build

CNCROi.com can make custom boxes for all your needs, any size, any shape, any material for any application! In this case, I needed a small custom box on my table to hold various little items that I keep losing so I decided to design and cut my very own!

In this case, I had a scrap piece of plywood in the shop so I decided to optimize my design to fit it so transforming scrap into something useful is a win-win.

I didn’t finish the box (paint or sanding) as for my personal use here in the shop, it doesn’t matter, I like the “laser cut” smoke esthetic.

Plywood is a wonderful material to work with for a host of applications, its lightweight, relatively strong and easy to paint and finish.

For my purposes, I just needed a box where sanding and painting weren’t required but if it was, that’s no problem either. We make everything custom to spec and custom boxes are no different.

Custom boxes are great for a huge variety of purposes, and it’s interesting the diversity of applications our boxes are used for.

For instance, this box could have been easily modified into the shape of a heart and given away for Valentines Day or as a wedding present.

The above custom Valentines heart box could have just as easily been made using plywood, acrylic or anything else, including stainless steel if you so desired and had the budget for.

When your options are endless with CNCROi.com, it means you have absolute and total design freedom, we make what you want, you aren’t stuck in any one way of production or process.

For instance, if you wanted 100 custom boxes, all different shapes and sizes or engraving details, that’s no problem for us as we produce our items on-demand.

It’s also pretty amazing how much a finish plays a role in the end-use of our custom boxes.

For instance, if we painted this box black, it would fit right in place at a tattoo shop or white for a wedding reception and they could just as easily be exactly the same design.

All our production cycles are based on the flat-pack concept, meaning we cut out the shapes in 2D and put them together to form a 3D object, custom boxes are no different.

This shows you a far more heavy-duty box than the one shown in this project but the utility and design concepts behind it are identical.

It weighs a lot more as a more heavy-duty material was used and far stronger due to the interlocking parts but custom boxes that are designed and fabricated at CNCROi.com are customized to our client’s needs.

CNCROi.com can fit anywhere you want along the chain of custom boxes as well, if you are a designer and need somebody to cut your box, we can do that.

If you don’t know anything about a design but have a photo of what you’d like, we can help you out there as well.

If you want roughed-out boxes, like this one is, for you to further finish and customize, we can do that too!

We have many ways of making custom boxes as well, in this blog post, the focus has been on producing the box using our Austrian wide-format industrial laser but we could have used our CNC router just as easily.

The methods we use to make our custom boxes depend on the design, volume and how much customization you wish to have done, we can also mix and match, so making the box using our CNC router and then personalizing with our CNC laser or the other way around.

The design and process options are endless with CNCROi.com to suit your budget, volume and timelines!

If you are wondering how we go about designing boxes, we start with a 3D model and then go from there upon the customer’s approval.

You can be as involved or “hands off” as you wish, design through final finishing.

The above box is a more complex design than the one being showcased on this blog post but the concepts and the designer behind them are the same.

Our custom boxes can also be completely customized in every way for absolute novelty appeal across all the different sides of it. It’s completely up to you!

If you have some boxes already made and want personalization, CNCROi.com can help you out with that, any font, any design, anyway you wish.

From designing custom boxes through to engraving and personalization, CNCROi.com has you covered!

Now that the plywood is finished being cut (there was no need to engrave my own box), it’s time to review the parts and start sticking them together.

Only carpenter’s glue was required for the building of this box, the design holds everything together and with glue, the final structure is plenty strong for my application.

If you are wondering how visually complex we can make our boxes, check this one out of another design I made a while back.

So as you see, a box by CNCROi.com has infinite opportunities in both function and esthetics and branding for your specific needs.

Once the various parts are glued initially, I like to run a bead of glue along the inside as well, this just seals up the edges and makes them “rounded” without having to do anything mechanical to achieve this same goal.

This is just a dry run right now, to make sure all the parts fit correctly and as you can see, it holds together without any glue already!

The top lid is made to just come-off easily, I didn’t need any type of hinges and wanted this custom box design to be as malleable for my use as possible, most of the time, the lid will be up or removed anyhow.

Here’s what the finished box looks like, I know it looks rough but for my purposes, I didn’t need to paint it and I don’t really care about the finishing – don’t worry, as a customer, you’d have something finished to your spec.

Now it’s time to officially glue this custom box together, even with big custom boxes production runs, CNCROi.com does a dry fit and glued assembly to make sure the design is sound before making hundreds and finding-out there was an oversight.

To allow the glue to dry in the correct way, you need clamps and weights.

This may look a little extreme but this was a scrap piece of plywood that was WARPED, so we are fixing that during the gluing process so that everything is straight!

Plywood is a wonderful material because it glues so well and strongly, once the carpenter’s glue is dry, this box will be indestructible and would take a lot of effort to take apart even if there isn’t one nail or staple in the whole design.

CNCROi.com makes TOUGH custom boxes!

You can now see the inside bead of glue, this can be finished by wiping off the excess but again, it’s a personal custom box and I don’t care, for me, whether you see this bead or not makes no difference.

After the bead has dried, the box is ready for active use on a shelf.

The top lid works perfectly, everything fits nice and snug.

I lifted the lid slightly in the final shot, I really like how this box came out, a coating of paint would do wonders but for my needs, unnecessary, as is any type of sanding.

CNCROi.com needed a custom box, and that’s what we have!

If I cared about the finish, I would have put masking tape on the front and back, it would have stopped the smoke stains from happening along the edges.

So, what will this custom box be used for? Holding metal bits for our CNC router, they are on a shelf randomly placed and this will keep them all together and easy to find.

Now you understand why we used wood and why the finish is unimportant.

Need custom boxes, any shape, any size for any application? Contact CNCROi.com right now!