So my hubby and I have taken up a new hobby (as if I need another)… we started building furniture! Well, he is doing the actual building, I would love to say that we* are building furniture but that day will come someday soon. I am having him show me the ropes with the power tools and helping him a little, but I enjoy finishing the pieces… sanding, priming, and painting.
This winter I came across this cool website by Ana White and found all these lovely plans and pictures for making everything from shelves and benches to nightstands and headboards, even coffee tables and dining tables. Ana White lives in Alaska and started doing some woodworking, building furniture for her own home (how’s that for an Alaska-tough DIY home maker!) a few years ago. Meanwhile, she started a blog that was called Knock Off Wood so she could share her projects and post plans, making them available to others. …For free! After a few years the blog got so big and popular, she soon had thousands of fans and people jumping on board …ha ha (no pun intended), so she created a great big website. There you can search and print building plans, and even create your own account to keep a ‘To-Do List’, share your own projects, and chat with other DIY builders.
So I got excited when I found all these wood-working possibilities at our fingertips, showed it to the hubby, printed off a few plans and he got right to work! He’s pretty handy, and is enjoying the wood working projects.
He has actually built a couple things for our house before we discovered Ana’s website. One of them being this awesome wall ledge for our photos in the hallway…
Isn’t it perfect for our wedding photos?? 🙂
With plan in hand, he picked up all the materials and started making a ladder shelf for our bathroom…
Soon enough it was time for me to get sanding, priming, and painting!
And so, I present to you our first lovely piece of DIY furniture…
We originally intended it to be for our master bathroom, but even though it fit in the intended space it just looked too crowded and big there. So, it has found a home in the guest bath and makes the guest bath feel a little more home-y.
We’re pretty happy about it, considering Pottery Barn has the same thing: Floor Standing Ladder for $199! I love that a lot of Ana’s furniture building is inspired by Pottery Barn. I think she has great taste.
If you’d like to see the building plan and details on the materials, time, and dollars that were used to do this project you can see all that here: Our New Ladder Shelf.
There’s more furniture building projects in the works right now and you’ll see them featured here soon. 🙂
Tell us what you think!
cooking all the thyme 