Low Cost Angled King Size Headboard With Storage and Foldable Tray

Intro: Low Cost Angled King Size Headboard With Storage and Foldable Tray

Living in an apartment means dealing with the overflowing leftovers all the time. This time i was cleaning up my wood pieces and realized that it's enough for another king size headboard with storage.

I made a headboard about 6 months ago, it is still ok, but the thing i don't like is I made the board as one big piece, so there is no way to reach the storage area without bothering the other one in the same bed.

This one took me about 12 hours including sewing, the only power tools had been involved were a cordless driver/drill and a sewing machine. I cut all the wood with hand saw and miter box because my last jigsaw blade just broken right before the black Friday and I didn't want get into the long checkout lines.

I didn't calculate the cost because most materials are leftovers, they are about

lumber

2*4*8ft * 1

1*4*8ft * 1

1*2*8ft * 5

particleboard 24*48*3/16in *2

small hinges * 8

standard size pillows or 18*18in cushion inserts * 4

fabric *2 yards

different sizes of screws of course

STEP 1: Make the Design

Now the first thing to concern about is the size of my living room in where i will make this headboard. I have to break it into 2 pieces so it's easier to move the pieces around for the regular use of the living room. (Much to my surprise that i done this in a single day.) Also I don't have very good steps management, with smaller sizes I can turn the sides much easier and more frequently.

I like doing pretty much everything in the bed, so an angled headboard is important to me, the storage space is just a "why not" bonus then. I divided the 76 inches long board into 4 pieces, it will be convenient to access the storage. Another feature is each small board could be folded back and turn to a beverage and popcorn tray or whatever when watching movies in the bed.

I designed this in 123D Design. It is exactly 2 of twin size headboards.

STEP 2: Build the Frame

The frames are both 39 in wide, the bed size legs are 24 in tall, wall side legs are 44in.

My bed with mattress is 20 in tall, but in order to fold the board with pillow to the bed and lay it flat, i need more room for the pillow's thickness, so the extra 4 inches is a piece of 1*4 inches beam that attached to the legs, the boards would be attached onto the beam by hinges then.

There's no fancy mortise or tenon (because i don't have the tools and skills ;) just wood screws.

Sorry I didn't take pictures of the building processing, my phone was hiding somewhere in the mess and I couldn't find it at that moment.

After the 2 pieces done, I put them together as the supposed to be, to check the hight and length of each part was as designed, and made sure they fit my bed.

STEP 3: Storage Space Base

Cut 2 pieces of 8*39 inches from the particleboard with craft knife, these are the base of the storage. You can use stronger board if you intend to put heavy load into the storage, for me the maximum weight will be 2 cats, so 3/16 in thickness is fine.

Attach the boards from the bottom. Since the frames are just half size of the king, it's easy to turn the upside down and work on it.

STEP 4: Add Headboards and Hinges

Again cut the particleboard, 19*19 in, 4 pieces.

This part is tricky for I didn't figured a proper way to pre fix the board to the 1*4 beam to attach the hinges. But finally I made it with my bare hands.

STEP 5: Improve the Strength of the Thin Boards

To cover the craft knife made rough edge of the boards, I used duct tape. It's not quite decent but just remember it's not a master piece.

I found the board is really soft, not sure if it's strong enough to take the load of people leaning onto it, not to mention free falling to it, so I attached 2 of 1*2 in bars to the back of each board. Use flat head screws and drill from the front size so fabrics won't be damaged.

STEP 6: Add Pillows or Cushions

Drill some holes along the edge to attach the pillows. I drilled 4 holes on each edges.

Use a heavy duty needle and thick thread to sew the pillows onto the boards hole by hole. This part is kinda boring.

Don't mind the ugly finish looking, it will be covered by cases after all.

STEP 7: Make Cases

Finally, the last and my least good at part, sewing.

Fortunately it's jolly easy sewing work, just 2 pieces of fabric sew back to back. I didn't even draw a pattern.

Only thing need to mention is, leave more than 5 inches more than the board length, to cover the the 1*4 beam.

So the size would be the board size plus the thickness of the pillow and extra 5 in in length, it's 22 * 28 in.

STEP 8: Enjoy Your Bed Time

Comments

[makemesomecookies]

I really like your headboard. The ability to store things behind it and to use sections of the headboard as tables is ingenious!

[iGreeny]

Thank you!

[gilbequick]

Good idea, I would have never thought about storage behind the headboard.

[iGreeny]

I wonder why not many people thought about it. I wanted to buy one but I found none could met both my requirements and budget, so I have to learn to how to make my own...