Cigar Humidor

Careful construction allows this Spanish cedar lined box to create a perfect seal to keep your cigars fresh.

Project #2204 • Skill Level: Intermediate • Time: 2 Days • Cost: $120

If I think about some of my fondest memories with friends, it’s the “guys weekends” away in the Northwoods of Minnesota. Canoe-in camping, fishing, and hanging out around the campfire. Inevitably, someone always brings a small travel humidor full of cigars.

I’ve always enjoyed those guys weekends, but I’ve also started to enjoy the occasional stogie while sitting on my deck overlooking the timber. Yes, it’s an unhealthy practice. But life’s too short, you know?

After so many of these trips, I’ve started to build my own collection of cigars at home. Rocky Patels, Ashtons, and Olivas… just to name a few. So I figured it was about time to build a half-way decent humidor.

Hardware: Purchase the hygrometer from this project.
Finishing Technique: See how to master the charred finish.
Alternate Build: This rotary box is a unique way to store cigars.
More Projects: Check out all of our articles on box making.
Bonus Download: See plans for “JFK’s Humidor” from our July 1997 issue.

Cigar Woodworking Project Cutlist and Diagrams

Humidor Basics

If you are a cigar aficionado, or if you have ever looked into cigar humidor construction, you know there’s some specifics that need addressed.  First, a humidor is a controlled environment. It’s meant to hold a certain humidity to help retain freshness of cigars. Also, a good humidor will be lined (or made from) Spanish cedar. You can read more about Spanish cedar in this article. A point though—you cannot use western red, aromatic, or any other cedar in place of Spanish cedar. Spanish cedar, technically a mahogany, will enhance the flavor of cigars as they reside in the humidor. Other cedars… not so much. Plus, Spanish cedar has a low affinity for expansion and contraction, meaning that once you get your humidor up to the correct humidity, the cedar will have expanded very little.

Stock Prep First

For my humidor, I built the exterior from hardwood, but lined the case with Spanish cedar. You can certainly build the entire humidor out of cedar, but I wanted other properties for the exterior of the case.

Most large lumber yards will be able to order in Spanish cedar. Unfortunately, most of it will be narrow. So, the first order of business is gluing up the narrow stock into wider pieces, like you see in Photo 1. After the glue was cured, I spent a little time planing a face flat. Spanish cedar works very easily with hand tools, so it’s a great time to work on flattening with a jack plane if you’re so inclined. I am, and it was a blast.

With a flat face and a straight edge, I took my stock to the bandsaw and re-sawed the stock to get two thinner boards. Because I had 4/4 stick, I simply resawed it down to half-inch thick panels. After resawing, the best practice is to let the stock sit for a day to acclimate and let it move if it wants to.

A little bit of time at the planer and drum sander brought the final thickness down to 1/4“. Because I did all of this prep-work for the stock upfront, I wanted to make sure the panels stayed as flat as possible. So, even though the Spanish cedar is about as stable as you can get, I stickered them and stacked them on the bench. You can see this in Photo 2 below. The biggest thing is to make sure that the stickers are all in line with each other, and to weight the top. Because I didn’t have what I felt like was enough weight to cover the 4 foot boards, I used a clamp to put pressure down on the bench while I worked on the other parts.

The Case Next

Call me goofy if you like (won’t be the first time, nor the worst I’ve been called), but I thought that building the case of the humidor out of ash was rather poetic due to its name. But, ash can be a fairly plain wood. So, as I started to think about building this humidor, I decided I wanted to do something different. For the outside of the case, I decided to heavily scorch and texture the wood.

First thing’s first—clear off the bench of anything flammable (or better yet, go outside). Because scorching is extremely stressful on the wood, I started with extra-thick stock so I could plane down the back and hopefully eliminate any cupping or twisting. To scorch, I use a MAP gas torch. The goal here is to do a heavy burn. When the surface starts to crackle red and the flame flashes bright yellow (see Photo 3), you’re there. Do this over the entire board—I did enough for the case and top at the same time.

After the burning is done, use a wire brush (brass is best in my experience) and follow the grain to work loose any carbon. Finally while the wood is still hot, wipe on a healthy coat of Howard’s Feed-N-Wax. The heat will melt the wax in quickly.

Now, it’s a simple matter of running the backside of the stock through the planer to final thickness, then building a mitered box. Cutting the miters is best done at the table saw. I use a digital angle gauge to set the angle on the blade (Photo 6), and then cut the miters. A good quality sled helps you get accurate cuts (here, I was testing out the Infinity Tools Sled). With the miters cut, cut a groove along the bottom of the workpieces for the plywood bottom.

Inherently, miters are a pretty weak joint. Glue alone might hold for a while, but at some point, it’s likely that an unfortunate drop will lead to a broken miter. To reinforce them, you could use a spline which is easy to cut on the table saw. Here, however, I wanted something a little more hidden. So, I used the Pantorouter to rout a mortise on the face of each miter. The Pantorouter makes this easy by tilting the table at a 45° angle then making the mortise. The mortise is sized for a small loose tenon. By making the loose tenon out of plywood, it’s plenty strong for what this humidor is going to be.

After routing all of the mortises (Photo 10), the parts are ready to glue up. Some liquid hide glue makes the glue up go together smoothly. I spread glue inside the mortise, then insert the loose tenon. Then, after smearing a little glue on the tenon, you can get all the parts together. Don’t forget to get the bottom of the box in place. I apply a series of clamps to the box as it’s drying. Double check the squareness of the case before the glue starts to cure. Because I’m building the lid and case separately (due to the scorching process and lid sizing), you really want everything as square as possible. Fighting a lid and box that don’t line up will be a headache later.

Building the Lid

The lid is constructed from thick, 8/4 stock. Like before, I start by scorching all the exposed surfaces. Then, its time to miter. To cut these, I rough cut them at the miter saw and used a shooting board to fine-tune the fit.

The cross-section of the top parts are basically an “L” shape. Form this large rabbet by making two cuts on the table saw. One cut with the bottom of the lid down, the next with the bottom of the lid facing away from the rip fence. You can see how these two cuts meet in Photo 13.

The top panel of the humidor (spalted maple in my case) is captured in a groove. You could cut this at the router table, but since I was already at the table saw, two quick cuts on the inside edge of each part is all that was needed. Like the case, I decided these miters needed a little extra strength. As before, a quick trip to the Pantorouter to form some mortises was just the ticket. Here, however, I didn’t need to tilt the table. Instead, I set up the angled fence, like you see in the photo below. This did require two setups­—one for each end of the miters.

The spalted maple panel I mentioned earlier is the final thing to knock out on the lid. This is simply a hardwood panel that’s rabbeted around the edge to create a tongue. I decided I wanted this panel to be gloss, in contrast with the matte parts of the box. So, before moving to assembly, I shot it with some spray lacquer. If you’ve never finished spalted maple before, be prepared. It soaks up approximately seven cans of lacquer before building a finish.

At this point, I glued up the lid. You can see this below. I’ve found with miters that have a spline or loose tenon, two clamps can be enough, depending on how tight the tenon fits, but have a few extra on hand just in case.

Now, one thing I didn’t anticipate was this—I didn’t like how the lid looked when I put it on the box. You’ll notice in the photo above, the top edge of the lid is square. It felt too jarring as it was. After I removed the clamps, I decided it needed a chamfer. So, I cut a 30° bevel around the entire top at the table saw. It softened the look a bit, and I felt like it fit much better.

Spanish Cedar Liner

At this point, you can break into your Spanish cedar. It’s time to line this bad boy. Start off by mitering the ends of the panels. Here, I cut the panels to fit, checking each one as I go. A snug, friction fit is best, as you want the finished box to be air tight. Don’t forget to cut a bottom panel as well.

Before gluing in any liner parts, you’ll want to rout a recess for your hinges. The hinges I used are side rail hinges from Brusso. They are brass but I took a bit of time to play mad scientist and nickel plate them.

Now, you can go ahead and apply the liner. The large panels for the top and bottom slip into place. I glued the top panel in with a few spots of glue across the center, but the bottom just floats. When it comes to the side parts, I glued just the center portion of the liner. They can then expand and contract separate from the ash. The box liner sticks a little proud of the sides so that it forms a good seal around the inside of the lid.  Likewise, on the inside of the lid, there’s a small perimeter strip of cedar that gets size so it closes tightly along the lip. A block plane and test-fitting is your friend here.

Add a Tray

On the inside of my humidor, I added a tray. Runners position it (mine’s tall enough for pipe tobacco tins to fit under it) and are glued in place. For the tray, I used box joints to form the joinery, and the bottom is a panel of cedar with slots cut in it. These are easy to do at the router table—just draw a handful of layout lines and carefully set a fence. I plunged the workpiece over the running bit and routed until my stop line.

Finally, I added a small lift to the lid before installing it on the hinges. The lift is made out of the same spalted maple and is notched into the lid. A little hand-sawing and chisel work create the recess for it.

Now, as any cigar connoisseur knows, you can’t just shove your cigars inside the humidor. First, you need to season it. Do this by wiping the liner down with distilled water on a rag. Don’t soak it, but you want to get the cedar to hold some moisture before putting in your humidifier (mine sits in the bottom, set apart from the cigars with a small friction-fit divider). Something like Boveda packs work great as well if you don’t want to mess around with the humidifier. I mounted a hygrometer on the inside of the lid to monitor the humidity and temperature—you’re looking for 65-72% humidity at 70°. Once the humidity is leveled out where you want it, the only thing that’s left to do is fill it up. 

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