Introduction: Stacked Cardboard Headphone Stand

this is how I made a stacked cardboard headphone stand for a pair of shure SRH-750DJ headphones. I made some pdf templates of the shapes I used for the different layers. a smaller set of inside layers allows the cable to pass through the stand if desired. I made the stand over two sunday afternoons, the body of the stand one afternoon then added the decorations the next week.

Step 1: Gather Materials

To make this stand you'll need some simple materials

cardboard
I used the double corrugated cardboard from a couch shipping box. any corrugated cardboard will work, the number of layers you will need to cut will change depending on the thickness of the cardboard you use


marker
for tracing the templates onto the cardboard, I just used a fine sharpie


knife
to cut out the cardboard, any small craft knife will do. you could also use a band saw if you have one. I used the small blade on my swiss army knife


glue
for gluing the layers together. I used the cheapest white glue I could find


template
I've made some pdf templates you can cut out and trace. the one included with this step contains all the possible lines you will need. on each step I've included pdf's of the shapes you'll need for the step. The pdf's are for A4 paper, if you're going to use letter sized paper you'll need to adjust the printout. The template should be 24cm long

Step 2: Cut Out Layers

cut out the paper template and trace it onto your cardboard. make sure the center line of the template is aligned the same way with the cardboard on each trace. I found it easiest to line the center line of the template up with one of the ridges of the corrugation. using double corrugated cardboard I needed 6 outside pieces and 4 inside pieces, you might want to double that if you're using single corrugated cardboard. once they're traced onto the cardboard carefully cut them out with your knife. I found it best to cut out the bottom half of each outside piece first then go back and cut all the top halves, it kept the integrity of the sheet better and made cutting the bottoms out easier. if you're careful and lay them out well you can even get an extra piece of wall art with the project =P

Step 3: Glue Layers Together

spread your glue over the surfaces of your pieces you want to glue together then set some weight on them and let them dry. I split my outside pieces into two equal groups and glued them together along with the inside pieces then glued all three sections together once they'd dried. a trick to making the glue up easier is to put the feet of the stand against the wall when you glue them so they're aligned with each other. if you were exact with your tracing and cutting it should make it easy to have the tops and sides aligned too. just try and do your best to make them as aligned as possible, if it comes out of the glue up worse than you'd like you can get some sandpaper and sand the edges smooth, the cardboard sands pretty easily.

at this point your headphone stand is functional! all that's left is to decorate it a bit!

Step 4: Add Decorations

use the templates again trace and cut out the decorations for both sides of the headphone stand. I used single corrugated cardboard for the decorations. you can glue a sheet of white paper to some of the parts to add some contrast. I used the cut out templates to see how paper would look on the different parts. I chose to make the base and 2nd layer of decorations white. glue the decorations on as if they were more layers to the headphone stand and then you're done! you could sand it, paint it or add different decorations as well to get it looking the way you'd like

Hand Tools Only Contest 2016

Participated in the
Hand Tools Only Contest 2016