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Since our trip to the White Water Shaker Village, I’ve been anticipating the poplar cupboard build. The cupboard, out of the four pieces we studied, has the most need for a furniture detective; A missing crown moulding, and the fact that the cupboard base isn’t raised off the floor, caused raised eyebrows and a good deal of conversation on how the piece may have looked back in the day.
It is clear that, at one time, there was a crown moulding on the front and sides of the cupboard. Long since gone is the moulding, but 2″ down the top edge there is a distinct line of demarcation in the surface finishes that shows exactly where the moulding ended. We needed a replacement design.
How do you devise a moulding design that might have been on this cupboard? Find an example on an existing piece of furniture, that’s how. But therein lies the problem. White Water was not a village that made furniture for outsiders. Pieces built in the village were made for community use, and I know of no examples of crown or cove mouldings that were used on White Water furniture. So I had to look elsewhere.
The closest Shaker community to White Water was Union Village, near Lebanon, Ohio. There are many furniture examples from Union Village, but all the pieces of Union Village furniture that I’ve found that have crown mouldings have pieces attached to the top of the case against which the moulding pushes while being nailed along the bottom edge. 
There are no indications (nails, screws or otherwise) that any pieces were attached to the top of the White Water cupboard. 
Therefore we could only conclude that the moulding was nailed in place along its bottom edge, but stood free at the top with the exception of a few blocking pieces for support. The moulding we designed is just a cove with a wide flat area at the top edge on which we plan to scratch a hint of a line to simulate an additional piece set above the cove.
Take a look at the drawing below. You can see the cupboard with the newly designed crown moulding in place. And, you can see that one of the cupboards in the drawing has feet while the second does not. Next time I’ll explain what this is all about and show you why this became another area in need of good detective work.
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