Desk from a Door
Saturday, January 3, 2009 at 12:15 AMI've been needing a new desk, but not bad enough to buy one. When Jef replaced our back door a few weeks ago, we ended up with a spare door and that solved the problem. A door desk! My mom and Roger have been using those for years since they're easy to build, easy to break down.
Of course, I had to get all crafty. Here's a recap of the project.
This is my OLD desk. I got it at a second-hand store when we first moved to Austin. Jef thinks I'm crazy, but I really liked it. Look at the cute handles! But you see the board RIGHT where your legs go? That was a problem. And it was small (but so was our apartment when we first moved here!). Anyway, it found a great home via Craigslist w/in MOMENTS of my posting it. Yay!
The door, freshly painted: 
Bird stencils: 
Spray painting the stencils. 
More spray painting: 
The finished product! 
Closeup of the birdies: 
A few notes about the project. I'm notoriously bad at spray painting. I can never get the technique right, how heavy, how light, how far away. So the stencils came out different than I expected, but still very cute. We got the desk legs from Ikea. They were $15 each and we plan to add a piece of plywood to the bottom to create a shelf. They had some legs with that piece already added, but it was an extra $25 per leg! No thanks, Ikea. We'll DIY that one. ;) Oh, last thing. There were two holes left where we removed the deadbolt and knob - we put those closest to the wall and they are perfect for dropping wires thru to the floor! I think doors were meant to be desks if you ask me.
Reader Comments (9)
What a fantastic idea! I really like your new desk.
Thanks, Ana! I'm really happy with it. I need some more storage since I lost the desk drawers, but that won't be hard. Also, this thing is HUGE! I'm loving all space.
Nice! Guess that won't work with a raised panel door? That Jef dude is very handy indeed. I love the stencils - and I agree - hard to do.
A raised panel door actually WOULD work - in fact, that's what we were looking for originally, but couldn't find anything on Craigslist. You would just need to get a piece of glass or Plexiglas for the top to make it a nice even surface. That would add considerably to the price, but you could get VERY creative w/ the door itself - paint each section a different color, add wallpaper or photos to the panels, etc.. You can do that w/ a flat door as well, but we stuck w/ paint to keep the cost down.
Nicely done! The raised panel idea is dead-on -- seems like the CEO of a marketing company in Austin has something done that way... :-)
The key with the non-panel doors is to use a solid core door. Years ago, there was a photo lab going out of business at 38th and Lamar. Photo lab = lots of small rooms. As they were doing the demo work, several of us snagged some doors (we asked first). I got a 28" door and a 36" door. Rather than painting them, I got some plastic laminate and some contact cement and gave them an entirely new surface. Then, I added 1.5" wood edging (stained) around the sides, and I filled in the door knob hole (singular -- they were interior doors) with some gray pipe to finish out the grommet (actually, I put the pipe in first so that the laminate would come over the edge cleanly).
With two doors, we were able to make a monster L-shaped desk that lasted through three houses. In our current house, we're down to just using the deeper slab for the desk...and it's slated for replacement. But, they lasted over a decade and cost me less than $30 in materials, so no complaints!
Looks awesome! Where did you get the filing drawers under the desk? I love them!
Looking at the Ikea website you pointed to, is the door just laying across those? It strikes me as unsteady. I make this assumption because you described the door-desk as easy to break down. Would you mind elabourating on that aspect of the construction?
Thanks for everyone's comments!
LW - I got the filing cabinet a few years ago at a Staples or regular office supply store. I tried to find a link, but I'm not finding anything at the moment. I had metal cabinets before and it got pretty beat up after a few moves. I went with plastic, knowing it might not look as sleek, but it seemed better suited to my lifestyle.
THOR - The legs have rubber stoppers on top of them, and the desk is sitting right on top. If you have a good, heavy door, this should be fine, but it can definitely move if you have a rough and tumble office. :) Another way to go is to get two filing cabinets and put the desk on those. They still aren't technically secured, but the 'base' is much broader.
Hope this helps!
garage door repair austin says:
Hi Kristen,
Just wanted to say that your new desk is looking beautiful,though your old one was not so bad,but great use of a old door. it was molded nicely. I like it.