Jess is half way through second grade already and already has homework to do every night. She really needed a place to get away from her little brother and sit quietly to work on it that wasn’t at the kitchen table all the time. I’ve wanted to build her a really nice desk for quite some time, but the shelves were really putting me off as I haven’t ever built anything like that and was worried about successfully making something that worked well. That problem was solved by the local Home Depot having a sale on prefab cabinets.

Two white kitchen cabinet three drawer units for half price sounded like a good deal! After getting them home of course I realized that they were all particle board and I could probably have done better even not having built any drawers before but they will do for now until I can get around to building something nicer for her when she’s ready for it. Some nice drawer pulls and organizers finish the drawers. I had to cut off the bottom “kickplate” area to bring them down to a reasonable height for a child’s desk. While I was working on it I also added some extra plywood and some blocks in the corners. They just weren’t sturdy enough to make me happy putting so much weight on them. But after some blocking and reinforcement I think they will do the job for a while.

The desktop is a piece of 3/4 sanded plywood. Nothing too fancy to look at but I did add a rounded molding all around and a nice finish. I’m considering it a sacrificial piece and if it gets all marred up with dings and scratches when she’s a kid I’ll make her a new one out of oak or something when she’s bigger and ready to really take good care of it.

It’s attached to the drawers just with some of those figure 8 table top connectors. Though the piece of plywood wont expand or contract enough to really need them it will make it easy to remove it if I need to move the thing around or pack it up.

The hutch though I’m pretty proud of as that is built from scratch. It’s also very simple, just 3/4 plywood with white enamel and a lot of different moldings and such. The height I did to match up with the top of the corner cubbard already installed in her room and the top of the bookshelves that I built her a while back.

Add some white beadboard for the back of the hutch, some lights and a couple of gingerbread pieces and it really looks like furniture. She has since customized it with lots of books and silk flowers and other such fun things. Luckily she doesn’t have so much homework yet that she doesn’t like to sit at her new desk.

The crown molding up top was a triumph of mitering technique... Or maybe it is just amazing that I have been using the cheap miter saw for so long now that I”m figuring out how to make it do what it is supposed to do. I actually built this desk several months ago and just haven’t gotten around to posting pictures till now. Since then I’ve actually invested in a nice new 10” powered miter saw that can actually cut a 45 degree angle that will meet up with another 45 degree angle cut with the same saw! All this wood working almost justifies all the money I’ve spent on power tools! To purchase this desk would have cost more than the price of my new table saw and new miter saw together. Though not more than that plus the cost of the new mortising tool that I have also recently invested in... My wife found out how much money I spent on that and now expects some serious productivity in the furniture building area. But more on that later.

The joinery in this piece is pretty much non-existent. I did use biscuits to reinforce the molding around the plywood table top, just to make sure that no matter what she did to it that it wouldn’t break off but apart from that there isn’t anything fancy going on in the top piece at all. The back behind the shelves is half inch plywood. The piece along the top runs the entire length of the piece and the vertical pieces have a cut out so that it rests in the groove. Then it’s all just screwed together. I considered doing dados and biscuits and the whole thing, but it really wasn’t necessary. Careful measurements for screws from the opposite side and it went together without any problems, all nice and straight. A little white wood putty to cover the screw holes and a good paint job. Since it was going to be painted it wasn’t necessary not to have screw holes everywhere, so that make it simpler too. A piece of felt on the bottom of each side finishes it so that it wont scratch the table too badly.

The molding along the bottom there serves to hold a rabbit for the bead board as well as strengthening up the 2 sides to each other which would otherwise be prone to bending. I used pocket screws to attach it to each side. I left the bead-board out for the trip carrying it upstairs as it was rather heavy and I couldn’t get ahold of it any other way. Then just hot glued it in when we got upstairs with it.

The lights are actually florescent puck lights. I absolutely hate those little tiny halogen bulbs as they just burn out constantly and get very hot. These are from “feit” electric and are meant for under cabinet lighting, but they are really very bright and make a decent quality light. Not too cool like some CF bulbs but white enough that they dont look green like other CF bulbs. I got them at Lowes. The bulbs actually attach to the sockets with tabs like a GU10 style bulb. They are covered with like a softish rubber almost like a silicon rubber that serves to soften the light and means you wont burn your hand if you bump them.

Building stuff like this in the garage means that we rarely get to pull our cars in, but it is a really important activity for me to switch to during the day when computer programming gets too frustrating. It also keeps me from sitting all day long and expanding all through my middle age...

-James

here are a few construction pictures: