I made these to use as counter stools for our breakfast bar. They're shown in the pics at our outdoor grill island but that's only until the finish dries completely. I built the set of three in "assembly line" fashion - in other worlds I built 12 leg assemblies, 3 seats, etc and then assembled it all. Total it took me around 8 -10 hours to build all three. My 11 year old daughter even helped. I taught her how to use the drill press and had her drill and countersink all of the pilot holes on the legs. I used pocket holes to attach the cross braces and the seats are attached with just wood glue. A pretty easy project and we ended up with a nice, simple set of counter stools.
Built from Plan(s)
Estimated Cost
$30 per stool
Estimated Time Investment
Day Project (6-9 Hours)
Finish Used
Minwax colonial maple for base; Minwax English chestnut for seats. Three coats of poly coat. The distressed look of the seats was accidental but we decided it looked nice so we stuck with it. For some reason I had a weird piece of pine that wasn't taking stain well (it was not drying after 24 hours). I ended up re-sanding and re-doing the stain only to have the exact same results. This time I tried wiping off the stain that wasn't drying with mineral spirits and it gave me this distressed look, which my wife and I decided looked nice, so we kept it.
Recommended Skill Level
Beginner