When giving away coasters I made, they were usually just tied into
a set with ribbon or burlap twine. However, for more special
occasions or people, I also made a custom coaster holder that
entailed a bit of tedious work.

The holder was a "V-shaped" tray tilted at a 30 degree angle, made
of walnut and doweled together. The tedious part was doweling the
necessarily thin walnut pieces.

To begin, the walnut was ripped and planed to 1/4" thickness and
sanded. The V was made of 1-1/2" and 1-1/4" widths, cut to the
length of 6 or 8 coasters. The butted joint was glued with
Tightbond and after it was dry, reinforced with (4) 1/8" dowels.
The front of the V was supported by a 3/8" dowel turned from
walnut (or purchased) blind inserted into a pocket in the bottom
of the V to elevate and support it. The front and rear openings
were closed with more walnut pieces. The front's piece was an
oversized V to match the shape of the sides, but with rebated
corners. Once glued in place and set, it was reinforced with (2)
1/8" dowels per side plus another at the bottom of the V running
back to reinforce the 3/8" dowel in the pocket behind. (See below
for how the doweling was done)

The rear piece was slightly taller than the front and the upper
part was of a similar rebated shape. It was taller to support the
back of the coasters, being tipped backward. Behind was a
wedge-shaped brace in its center to further prevent it from
tipping, along with a 4" wide square cut bottom to prevent
side-to-side tipping. All joints were first glued, then doweled
and sanded.

For drilling a 1/8" hole in 1/4" edge material, a typical drill
and bit would not work. The slow speed of the drill would permit
the bit to catch on grain and not make a hole where desired OR to
drift off as it got deeper. I had two solutions and both worked
well. The first was to use an air powered right angle drill
cobbled together from an angle grinder and a Jacob's chuck. The
other was to use a Dremel mototool with an 1/8" collet to hold the
bit. In both instances, I tried using both a typical twist bit
and an augur-type bit. The lead point on the augur-type bit
helped some, but the titanium coated twist bit lasted much longer.
The faster the drill bit turned, the more accurate the holes were.

--
Nonny

You cannot make a stupid kid smart by
handing him a diploma. Schools need standards
to measure the amount of education actually
absorbed by children. Don't sacrifice the smart
kids to make the dumb ones feel good about themselves.