So, my skills have been as a cobbler, handy kind of guy for decades. Rough shelving for shop/garage basement storage etc... I've always done all my home maintenance and repairs so I'm familiar with a lot of stuff in and around the house. However I've never attempted a finished piece of furniture before. As always, I love the build and hate the finishing process.
My daughter had a pretty new mattress that she loved which was 13 inches thick and her celling is the standard 8 feet. Consider these kind of things before you build this design. We did and the plans were altered a little bit. We'll be building the bookcase later and either buying or building a desk as well. She can set up in bed with several inches above her head and there will be plenty of room over her head in a standard height office/computer chair underneath. All I basically did was; add a few inches to the height of the legs and uprights for the guard rail (4" I think), increased the head, foot, back and guard rail top planks from 1X4s to 1X6s. Which changed the dimensions of some of the spacers too. She isn't sure she wants the top rails on it but I think I'll put them on later.
We made our own bunkie board for firmer support, which also raised the thickness about 1/4" over just slats.
Details: Ladder fits tight between the leg and the guard rail. Glad I got those dimensions right. We'll be using Velcro to fasten the ladder to the bed (it's that tight, it'll be fine and she's 14yrs old). This way we can take it off easier to clean, move etc. Glue and screw everything you can except the long boards that will allow it to be broken down. Glue them and you'll never get it apart without breaking it. I used Titebond III on everything else with lots of clamps along the way.
On the front and back of the ladder treads I simply smeared some filler in the joints to smooth them out. You can see the result in the pictures. There is one closeup of the finish so you can see how it turned out doing it the way I did. If you want is smoother then a 220 sandpaper finish is what was called for on the clear finish, which I didn't do.
I also said it was a weekend project 10-20hrs. Had I bought better wood and did an easier finish it would have been. My learning experiences/errors made it longer than that for me.
Lessons Learned:
1. Buy better wood! If you want a better finish buy better wood. By the time I was finished filling, sanding, filling again, sanding some more... I used almost a whole quart of filler to make knotty pine smooth. Just buy smooth wood, I'm tellin ya! Hours of work and dry time. Again, if you want a good finish, then you need to shellac knotty pine so the resin from the knots doesn't bleed through. Better wood might have added 5-10% to the materials cost but saved several hours and would have looked even better that what I achieved. Better wood and you could cut the shellac ($15 per quart) if you didn't want the two tone distressing.
2. Check the actual board dimensions. For outer facing pieces I bought some better wood with no knots (radiata pine). These were for the outside pieces on the legs. They were just a bit wider than the common boards that were sandwiched between them... more sanding and filling to get a nice square smooth finish. It also made clamping and gluing them together harder before the filling and sanding could even begin. See number 1 above. lol
Anyhow, I'm not afraid of building furniture anymore and my daughter loves it. OH, yes now we have to repaint her room and accessorize for the ocean cabin look. More projects with my daughter. YAY!!!!
Thanks Ana
Comments
colsen
Sun, 11/25/2012 - 09:51
That is a fantastic idea and
That is a fantastic idea and the table top is beautiful.
Pam the Goatherd
Mon, 11/26/2012 - 09:38
That is the most beautiful
That is the most beautiful litter box I have ever seen!
moosmani
Wed, 11/28/2012 - 16:59
Genius!
Genius!
blueskiesinNM
Mon, 06/17/2013 - 12:23
So we are not crazy!
Love your use of the buffet. Our family has discussed making a piece of furniture like this for our smaller dog. Nice to see someone has done it! Our big dog has scheduled feedings but our little dog would prefer to be a free feeder. Poor thing chokes down his food in our pantry listening to our big dog breathing under the door waiting for him to finish. When he is done we open the door and the Big, greedy dog bolts in looking for left overs. A family member has to wait patiently for the little dog to finish so he can escape the pantry. I really don't want a doggy door in my pretty swinging bi-fold doors to my pantry which is also access to our kitchen.That would be a pain to have to keep closed all day. But this buffet idea is super cute! Thanks for the inspiration.
wayneled
Fri, 01/09/2015 - 22:01
tile top
I know this is an old post, but I'll ask anyway
I love this piece and am in the planning stages for ours. Thank you for sharing!
I am Wondering how you went about the table top. Did you install a 3/4 ply on top but not flush, allowing room for mortar and tile? If so how much room did you allow for the tile/mortar? 1/2 inch? How did you keep the surface of the tile level and uniform? Lastly, did you seal the tile with anything when you finished?
Aesthetically, the tile top really sets this piece off and I really want to make my own.
Thanks