Build A Modern Coffee Table and Matching End Tables

If you’ve spent much time shopping around for end tables or a coffee table, I’m sure you’ve noticed that there are oodles of styles — and quite the variety of prices! And if you’re like me, somehow the furniture that you just HAVE to have is always the one with the out-of-this world price tag. Never the budget-friendly piece. Am I right?? That is one big reason why I love to DIY — I can make the look that I want, to the specifications I want, for a fraction of the designer price!  

And that is exactly what our guests today did… Kayla and Justin found a modern coffee table that they loved and that fit their style — but not their budget! So instead, they took some time, elbow grease, and lumber, and DIYed it:

Check out these other stylish coffee and ends tables that we love, and scroll down to get the tutorial for Justin and Kayla’s modern coffee table and end tables:

DIY Building Plans, Hexagonal Moroccan Style End Table | Remodelaholic

IKEA Lack Side Table Hack | Designing By Numbers featured on Remodelaholic

Reclaimed Wood Coffee Table with Hairpin Legs | Adventures in Creating featured on Remodelaholic 

And now, here are Kayla and Justin to show you how they made their coffee table and end table set:

Modern Coffee Table and End Tables
by Justin and Kayla of Home Coming

Hi everyone! We’re Kayla and Justin from Home Coming and we’re pretty darn excited to be a guest here at Remodelaholic! We’re DIY and home bloggers with a lot of love for updating a house on a budget. Justin is a carpenter by day (so he’s handy) and I’m in advertising (so I’m creative), so we’re the perfect team for taking on the task of updating our 1920’s Minneapolis house. Check out the progress we’ve made on our home and other DIY projects here!

We’ve taken on DIY remodeling and DIY decor, but with Justin’s skills we decided it was about time to take on DIY furniture.  Rather than paying designer prices for new furniture, we find that it’s much cheaper (and more fun!) to do it ourselves.

So today we’re showing off our DIY coffee and end tables that we made custom for our living room.

I had my heart set on a modern, designer table similar to this piece, but at a price tag of over $350 for just the coffee table, I knew that wasn’t attainable with our little budget.  Cue Justin to save the day!

Since I chose a simple design with lots of straight lines and nothing intricate, this was a simple DIY project that would only take us a couple of days for a matching set of coffee and end table. And the best news was that we had a lot of the wood we needed just laying around the garage!

We started with the coffee table and mimicked our inspirational designer piece.  We used the same dimensions (14.6″H x 32.3″W x 32.3″D), but decided to take a few creative liberties to make it fit withing our home style and our DIY capabilities.  The end table instructions are exactly the same as the coffee table, just at different dimensions (23.5″H x 16″W x 16″D),  so rather than outlining them twice, just change the dimensions and off you go!

Coffee Table Materials Needed:
(12) 2″ x 2″ x 36″s of Poplar for the base.
          We bought this at Home Depot, where they had pieces pre-cut in shorter, 36″ pieces so they
          were easy to transport home in our little Toyota.
(10) 1″ x 4″s of Alder for the solid wood top

End Table Materials Needed:
(5) 2″ x 2″ x 36″s of Poplar for the base .
(6) 1″ x 4″s of Alder for the solid wood top

Materials Needed for Both:
Wood Glue
Bondo filler (for painted area)
Stain & paintbrush
Metallic spraypaint & primer
Varnish

Tools Used: 
Belt sander
Orbital sander
Nail gun
Clamps
Miter saw
Circular saw
Air compressor
Screws, nails, etc

One of the creative liberties we took with these tables is to make the bases out of wood instead of metal like the designer table. As a carpenter, Justin works with wood and not metal, so making the base in wood, then spray painting to look like it’s metal was much easier for us. 

Here’s how we made the base:

Cut all of the 2″x2″s to the size of your table height (four pieces) and surround (8 pieces for base and top).

Laying out one side at a time, glue and clamp the 2″x2″s in place, using a nail gun to secure the pieces.

Once you have the entire surround built, put a squaring block (those triangle things in the corners) in each corner on the top portion of the base surround for added support and to help ensure that the legs are all “square” with each other.

Fill all nail holes with wood filler, allow time to dry, then sand them down smooth.

Then it was my turn to make it pretty! As I mentioned before, I chose to spray paint the legs to give the illusion of metal. I used Rust-oleum Semi Gloss Protective Enamel in grey for the first coat. Then Rust-Oleum Hammered in dark grey for the final two coats.

And here’s how we made the top:

While I was spray painting, Justin worked on the solid wood top of the coffee table. This square piece of wood (32.3″ x 32.3″) was made out of 10 individual 1″ x 4″s of Alder. We had these pieces of wood laying around the garage, so they cost us $0!

Justin laid them all out to avoid the larger knots in the wood, glued them together and clamped them overnight to make sure it was a strong hold.

The next morning, he cut the slab down to fit flush with the base using a circular saw, then sanded it down to be smooth. I stained it with two coats of  Natural colored wood stain by Varathane and one coat of Clear Satin fast-drying poly spray from Minwax.

After I was done staining and a couple hours of dry time, Justin attached the top & bottom with screws – secured from the bottom so we don’t need to cover screw holes.

So after only $75 for the coffee table, $30 for the end table, and three days of work, we consider this DIY project a success! 

Great work and a great tutorial, Kayla and Justin! Thanks so much for being our guests!

Head over to Home Coming and see all the progress that Justin and Kayla are making on their home. 

Published: November 26, 2013Filed Under: Decorate, DIY Project Plans, Furniture Building Projects and Plans, Guest Bloggers, How To, Living Rooms, Tables, Tutorials Tagged: Coffee and End Tables, Guest Bloggers, Living Rooms, Modern

About Cass

Cassity started Remodelaholic with her husband, Justin, to share their love for knocking out walls together. Since then, Remodelaholic has become a great community and resource for all those wanting to know how to make their builder-grade home BEAUTIFUL on a budget!