Loft Bed For Our #1 Grandson

[Angie Orfanedes]

Here’s my progress on the latest project. I developed the design from pictures in catalogs and the web. While no one will categorize this as fine furniture, I am hoping it will please my #1 customer, our 11 year old grandson.

Loft Bed 001.jpg

The material is basically construction pine 2x6’s, 2x4’s, ¾ birch plywood, and some ¾ pine, also. I took a long time selecting each piece of lumber to find acceptable pieces. The plywood from HD is domestic, and I was generally impressed at the lack of voids. However, the “A” side of the plywood showed some strange grain patterns for birch. I was concerned about getting clean cuts in the plywood, but a new 40 tooth Freud combo worked very well.

The corners are two 2/6’s glued and screwed together (deck screws) with fluted outside surfaces – the screw holes are hidden with dowel plugs. I made a fluting router jig from ideas found on Sawmill Creek, and it worked amazingly well. I used a ½ bit set ¼ inch deep, and cut each flute in one pass. After doing a trial piece, I did all the fluting in about an hour or so, and I was happy to get to the end of that process without messing up.

Loft Bed 002.jpg

Also made a dado router jig for the dados in the bookcases and the ladder – also from borrowed ideas. The bookcases are held together with glue and pocket screws. I edged the plywood with ¼ inch strips cut from pine.

The desk is also made from plywood. It is 21-3/4 inches wide and has one drawer with a built in pencil tray. Hopefully this will encourage good study habits. In order to personalize it a bit more, I carved our grandson’s initials in the drawer front.
Loft Bed 005.jpg
Loft Bed 007.jpg

Besides stain and finish, I need one more piece of ¾ plywood for holding the mattress. It will have a blue sky with clouds painted on the bottom. That way when he is sitting at the desk, there will always be blue skies overhead. Hope I can figure out how to paint clouds.

I am looking forward to finishing this project over the next couple of weeks, but I am also sure I will miss it when it is delivered. Sure hope the grandson likes it.

[John Keeton]

Angie, what a neat plan!! I did a much smaller version many years ago, but not nearly as well thought out and executed. This will see at least a couple of generations of use, I am sure.

Make sure to do some test boards on stain - the pine and birch will react differently.

[Doug Carpenter]

Very cool.

I built one for my daughter and she passed it on to her brother. I always wanted to put a desk under it like that. He really likes to pretend he is a policeman so I built a jail under it. I was looking for a picture of it but the one I took had him in it wearing his underdrawers.

So I decided not to post it.

Nice job, can't wait to see the finished project.

[John Thompson]

Excellent plan.. great build and I wouldn't spend too much time with worry about if he will like it. I can't imagine why he wouldn't?....

Well done...

[Angie Orfanedes]

Well, the loft bed is finished. Delivery to grandson is this Saturday. Here's the way it looks now:
Loft Bed 013.jpg

The finish is Dark Walnut Minwax with poly on top. It was a challenge taming the grain on that construction pine to "match" the birch plywood grain. The desk top has a few coats of handrubbed poly, as well.
Loft Bed 014.jpg

The plywood that holds up the mattress has blue sky and puffy white clouds painted on the bottom, so that will be overhead when he is seated at the desk (studying, of course). These are my first clouds - I followed instructions that I found on Youtube.
Loft Bed 016.jpg

Now, on to the next project - hopefully smaller and simpler.

[John Thompson]

It turned out well Angie. It reminds me of the furniture I built back in the early 70's as about all I had was my native southern pine which is not the easiest wood to apply stain too. I also used a dark walnut stain back then on pine as the darker look was popular on country furniture I made those days.

Habersham Furniture out of Clarkesville, Georgia got rich making country furniture with that dark tone in the 70's up to the early 80's.