DIY Furniture Designs

When designing handmade furniture, take great care in locating a place(s) of rest. Then consider the many ways you can express the supporting vertical force. Thin, straight vertical lines create the strongest expression, but this is certainly not the only option. As a point of contrast, hiding vertical forces with horizontal lines can be quite effective. In the most successful design applications, a massive object may appear to float above the ground.

Can you imagine other ways to stabilize the 'stack table'? Variations on resistance are as endless as the imagination. A common mistake in building diy bookshelves is to leave out bracing. If you just build a rectangular box with shelves suspended between the sides, it only takes a light push to deform the box into a parallelogram. A strong push creates enough momentum to flatten the shelves completely, regardless of the strength of the fasteners. A common way to resist lateral force is to put a sheet of backing across the entire bookshelf, which also serves to prevent objects from falling between the bookshelf and the wall. What if you wanted to see through a set of shelves and access it from both sides? Little right triangles tacked on to each corner would do the trick, or larger triangles at the four outside corners.

There are common sense approaches to assembling furniture. Always begin with a rough layout. The framework must be constructed first (in most cases). Bracing is applied after the structure is assembled, but before it becomes too rigid for adjustment. Finishing touches or cosmetic notions are usually applied as late as possible in the fabrication process. Finishes are nearly always applied last. These ideas should be applied to the design process in this order as well.

Don't just throw screws into a piece of furniture. Once you have spent quality time on the design, design the placement of fasteners as well. Especially if your design requires fasteners to be exposed, they are a part of the expression of forces. Align them to express vertical or horizontal lines, cluster them to create chunky, punched corners or spread them as thinly as possible for balance and elegance.

I discussed the choice of fasteners earlier, but if you are using screws with large heads you may opt to hide them as often as you can. If most of the structure can utilize hidden screws, it may be that you can use finish nails on finished surfaces to maintain a clean look. Whenever you do use screws, drill pilot holes into the outside surface to ensure it does not crack. I prefer the pilot and a deep countersink. The pilot should be a loose-fit hole. The threads do not need to grip the outside material at all. When the threads grip the deeper material, the head of the screw pulls the two pieces of wood tight.


Wood can be painted, stained, or left nude. For indoor furniture, these choices rarely have practical implications but there is a big movement against chemical finishes which produce off-gas. These chemicals release unhealthy gases and particles into the air throughout the life of a piece of furniture. I prefer to design heavily for wood grain and leave the wood nude. To protect the wood I use a natural wax product, such as Butcher's Wax. Of course there are times when the wood at your disposal is simply not attractive. Textures, glazes and contact paper can be lively alternatives to staining or painting and you can design and build your own furniture