Before I started veneering, I came up with a concept for protective grills. Here's a rendering. Note the narrow frame on top and bottom, and the way the grill is inset a small amount from the cabinet edges.

For the grills, I didn't want to use black cloth; I want something semi-transparent that doesn't completely break up the vertical lines of the overall design. My plan was to use a 1/2" wide (or so) frame on the sides, with a minimal frame (maybe narrow "U" channel or something similar) on the top and bottom. I wanted the grills to float away from the baffle by about 3/8" (to reduce diffraction effects from the frame).

Why is it important that I planned (more or less) the size of the grills before veneering? Because I planned to embed disc magnets in the cabinet, under the veneer. Matching magnets in the grills would hold them in place. To make sure the magnets would line up, I made a simple drilling template.

It took me nearly nine months, but I finally got around to constructing the grills. I actually built them twice.

I made them from perforated metal with 5/32" holes (Reliable Hardware Part #RH-3152). Their open area is 62%, which is about the best I could find. I highly recommend Reliable Hardware. My order specified a size of 13 1/4" x 7 5/8" for each piece, and that's exactly how they measured, with crisp, clean edges.

I didn't use U-channel for the top/bottom edges. I just built a frame out of narrow pieces of scrap. A saw kerf formed a channel for the perforated metal. I painted the inner edges before glue-up to make sure I didn't get paint on the metal when I painted the rest.

For the standoffs, I cut 1/2" lengths from a 3/8" dowel. I drilled 1/8" deep holes in the frame to hold the dowels.

To counterbore the magnet holes in the standoffs, I clamped a piece of scrap to my drill press and drilled a shallow 3/8" diameter hole to act as a cradle. Then I put each dowel segment in the hole and drilled a stopped 1/4" diameter counterbore. (My magnets were 1/4" diameter.) The first dowel segments I drilled rotated inside the scrap and burned. After that, I just held each segment in place with needle nose pliers while I drilled to keep them from rotating.

After painting the frames, I installed them on the speakers, and I was done.

No I wasn't.

Two members of the family (who will remain unnamed here), decided they didn't like the narrow top/bottom frame segments. They didn't like the inset frame either, telling me it looked like a  mistake. I don't think my paint job was very good either. Grr... I pulled up the rendering at the top of this post. "Look, this is what I showed you before I started!" Did they care? Were they persuaded? No, they weren't.

I rebuilt the frames using a uniform 1/2" width stock with mitered corners. As with the first set, I used the saw kerf slot to hold the metal, and I use the same type of standoffs. To make sure my paint job was up to standard, I sanded them carefully, sealed them with shellac, and sprayed on two coats of Rust-Oleum semi-gloss black. I painted them after assembly, so I had to use cut sheets of paper to mask off the metal.

Oh, the things I do to preserve domestic tranquility... I do have to admit that the new grills look just as good to me as the originals.
 

With that, I really was done. Thanks for reading!