Alissa and I have been looking for a good hallway bench for a long time. We leave our shoes near the door, and it’d be far more convenient to have a place to sit. We’ve been doing it for 6 months, and it was starting to get on our nerves. Luckily, there are a lot of benches in German furniture stores. It seems as though a large family table with a bench along one side (for the kids?) is a pretty typical setup, so if you wander around the dining room section, you’re apt to see several benches. But most benches don’t have room for shoes; they put a crossbar underneath for support. The benches that don’t need the support bar cost 800 Euro, and that seems a bit much for three pieces of wood and some wood glue.
So this Friday, we took matters into our own hands.
Expert craftswoman at work.
We went to Obi, the local Home Depot, and found some surprisingly nice, solid wood. We had the store cut it into proper sizes, and picked up some angle brackets and screws. The angle brackets had a brass finish on them, which would have looked really nice against dark wood. But the only piece of wood we found (without dents) was lighter, so I sanded the brackets until they turned silver. That might have removed all the anti-rust protection, but that’ll just make it look more awesome with time. We went back to a friend’s garage to build it.
Finished bench.
It’s super sturdy and doesn’t sag at all. Even with three people sitting all at once. We decided not to stain it or apply polyurethane, because we want to see how it ages as the years go by.
It’s so nice to put on my boots without sitting on the floor.
In its natural environment.
Beautiful