This bench has been one my favorite projects that I have ever done. This is one of the last pictures of it as it just became too shabby to keep. Yes, those cute babes are our twin grands.
The inspiration came from this post on Junk Market Style about how to make an old bed into a bench. With my bench on the front porch almost rotten clear through I knew that this would be my solution and started looking for an old bed that would work.
Goodwill came through with this frame for all of $7.00. What a great deal, don't you think? I figured it would be perfect for my bed to bench project.
I started by cutting the foot board in half. Actually, I ended up taking an additional 3" off each half to make the bench more in proportion.
Before I started screwing anything together, I sanded each of the pieces to take some of the paint off so that when I gave it my finial coat of paint the wood would show through. The next step was to screw the foot board onto the headboard to create the right and left sides of the bench.
If you notice, I also shaped the foot board pieces so that they would fit better at the back and look like they were made that way. Otherwise the foot board pieces would have hit the headboard above the flat part of the legs and it just would have been weird.
I then built a box inside the bench out of 2x4's. This gave a place to attach the slats for the seat of the bench. I also painted the 2x4's and the slats with Kilz to help keep this bench from rotting as it will be outside.
I went to our local Wal-Mart on a quest for a soft pink spray paint and found this great ballet pink. So being the spray paint artist that I am, I coated the bench with two coats of the pink paint and when it was dry I took my handy sander to it. I love the shabby chic look that sanding off part of the paint gives.
This bench was outside in the Midwest weather for 9 years when I just couldn't repair it any more. But there is always good junk around to re-purpose.
Go out and make your world more beautiful!
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