Bed to Bench DIY

 Its time for some more reinvention in my life.  Flea.o.logy is next week, and the little projects are all lined up. 

This little bench started life as a 3/4 size bed, sometime in the late 1800's.

By the time I found it, it had lost its rails, but still had a lot of charm.

The first step towards becoming a bench requires cutting the foot board to the right depth for arms.  you can see, with the cut foot board above that above 10 inches were taken off.

 After the arms were put in place with very long screws from the back, a two by four was placed across the back below the headboard, and another across the front.  The front one was set back far enough to allow for the 'skirt' I planned to make using the applique from the footboard that matched the one on the headboard.

With the two by fours in place, Mr. P cut pallet boards, and screwed them in place.

I cut the skirt with a jig saw to echo the design of the applique, then screwed it onto the two by four that supports the board seat, reattached the applique, and started painting.

 

The painting took twice as long as all of the construction put together.  I guess that 113 year old pine gets pretty thirty.  But I had a nice hot day, and a fan blowing, so it dried fast, allowing for continual repainting.