While writing my next book, I’ve been sitting in our IKEA chair and using a wire plant stand as a side table. This leaves my drinks in precariously tipsy situations, and there’s not a lot of room for my phone or anything else. Obviously other people sit here too, and I chew my nails nervously whenever someone sets down a drink with too much confidence.
We needed a real side table.
Elsewhere, we have 2 very cool table stands with black metal legs and solid, natural wood tops that look like they were sliced off big logs. The problem is that these are about $75 each now, and I’m not spending that on a side table…when I can make something similar that’ll work just fine.
My table? About $15 since I already had spare table legs. Even if you need every single thing, the supplies cost under $50 – the wood round is only $9!
Supplies:
(As an advertising affiliate and Amazon Associate, I earn a small commission from qualifying purchases. But it doesn’t cost you anything extra and helps me keep up my site!)
- wood round (mine was a 15-inch round)
- wood stains (I used dark walnut and natural)
- Table legs and screws (I only used 3)
- spray paint (optional)
- clear spray paint for sealer on wood
Tools:
Step 1: Prep the legs (optional). If you buy the right color table legs, ta-da, you’re ready! I, however, had white legs leftover and so decided to spray paint them instead of buying new ones.
I took my legs outside since it was a nice 60-degree day. After setting them on something I didn’t care about (I’ll be fixing up our chairs at some point 😆), I sprayed the legs from every angle to be sure they were covered. I did 2 coats.
Again…just buy the right color and then this isn’t necessary, but painting them is an option.
Step 2: Test leg placement and plan. Once my legs were dry (which was fortunately before it started snowing!), I brought them inside and set them on the wood round. Make sure you do this on whichever side will be your table’s underside! I played with the positions a bit but ended up putting the corners/points of each leg base about a half inch from the outer edge, then 11.5 inches between each leg base’s corner – like in a triangle.
Once in position, I used a pencil and marked where each screw hole went. You want to do this FIRST so you know how much you can cut off – you need to be sure you leave enough room for the legs to attach!
Next, I took my pencil and drew a line all the way around the wood round, curving and waving the line a bit so it would create my “live edge” once cut. In some places I came in an inch or so, but you don’t have to take off much to reshape the “circle” so it looks more…natural, I guess. I did make sure to draw my line so that I’d cut off the rounded edge, because that wouldn’t look right at all – you want a straight edge all the way around.
Step 3: Cut the wood round. I did this in my garage, since it gets a little messy. Using my jigsaw, I held down my wood round and cut along my line (as best I could). I thought this would be harder than it was, honestly. It took me maybe 5 minutes.
Step 4: Sand and stain. I used my little handheld sander, but you could just use sandpaper and go over everything really well. You want to get your edges rounded and smooth, since this table will be touched a lot, and you don’t want to catch any sleeves or blankets or anything on rough edges. I sanded my new edge all the way around, then dusted it off.
You can just use one stain over the whole thing. I decided to do the edge in a darker stain and the top in a lighter stain. I’d seen this done and liked the added dimension it gives the “live edge,” kind of like where darker bark would be around a slice of log.
First, I went all around the “live edge” and used a small brush to apply dark walnut stain. I didn’t worry about covering the side/edge too nicely, but I did make sure I didn’t get any on the topside. Once that was almost dry (impatience kicked in), I again sanded the edge and kind of buffed off and smoothed out the stain so the top wasn’t a distinct-looking line.
Then I used a brush and applied a lighter, natural stain to the top. I covered the whole top first, and then I went around the topside edge and wiped the stain over the sanded corners to really blend the two stains around the edge.
Step 5: Seal/protect the wood. Once the stain was dry, I used a clear, satin-finish spray and covered the top and surrounding sides of the tabletop. You could also use a polyurethane if you want a thicker, smoother finish. I used the spray option largely because I also needed to give my painted table legs a coat for protection.
Step 6: Attach the legs. When that was dry, I flipped the tabletop over and lay it on a paper towel to make sure it didn’t get messed up on my work table. Using the marks that were still on the under side, I positioned the legs and screwed them on.
Done!
This certainly works better than a wire plant stand to hold drinks, phones, snacks, etc. And I like that it looks good with our other tables even if it’s clearly its own thing. It looks more natural and interesting than a plain, round tabletop, so 👍.
DIY Must-Have Lists
