I wish I had some better pictures of the riser. The shelf is a glued on piece of wood covered in leather. You don't want to make a big bulky handle then cut it in half for a shelf. You want it to be small and lively in the hand. If you do that with an all wood design but cut out the shelf,it will be too weak and could break. The only way to make it strong enough to cut out a shelf is to make it big and bulky like a laminated recurve.