Making a desk out of countertop

[Moxie]

Has anyone made a table/desk out of a kitchen countertop? We have a 9 foot section in our school room and I would love to have a long work surface there. Ready-to-go desks that long are expensive. Is it a crazy idea?? Are countertops expensive (never even looked so I have no clue)??

[Ellie]

We bought a 10' section of laminate counter at Lowe's for, oh, $20. Mr. Ellie built a frame for it, with cubbies below for storing those plastic storage bins, to go in the room we use for crafts and sewing and whatnot. I could *totally* see using it as a work surface in a homeschool room.

[AndyJoy]

My husband built me a craft/computer/future homeschooling desk with an 8' counter. It seems like it was more like $45-50 than $20 at Home Depot, but it's entirely possible that the finish I picked was a more expensive option. DH built and painted two 1/2" thick plywood boxes for the two ends that were custom-sized to my storage bins. I chose to have a tall counter that I could stand at for a computer workstation or sit at on a tall stool with a back. He hung two 8' long shelves above the desk where I store more bins of supplies. I love it!

[KatieJ]

If your DH is not handy and able to build legs and what not, you can put countop sections on top of file cabinets, one for each end.

[plansrme]

I have a desk made from Ikea butcher block counters. My 6' or so section is in an alcove, so I (yes, "I") screwed 2x4s into the studs around three walls, cut the Ikea top to fit and slid it in. I don't think I screwed it to my frame, but I may have. It is perfectly flat, level and stable. You can stand on it. If I only had one wall to work with, and no sides, I would have screwed a 2x4 to a back wall, screwed the top to the back wall to keep it from sliding around, and used a file cabinet or something similar on each end.

 

Ikea also has laminate sections available cheap.

 

The Young House Love people did something similar in one of their rooms. I thought their counter was ugly, but they might have suggestions for how to attach it to the wall or base.

 

Terri

[Ann.without.an.e]

Yes, we have done this twice. You can buy drawer stacks, make them yourself, or use filing cabinets. Even better, us the Ikea bins if they have some that size :D

[crazyforlatin]

I've done this using Ikea countertop, similar to this http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/50086416/#/30086417. I used their wood cabinets and secured them to the countertop using L-shaped hinges. You don't need to use cabinets - you could use their trestle legs or build wooden ones on your own. I'm in the process of building another desk, but a smaller one, and the table top will be from Home Depot. It costs under $50 for the wood and I will be fastening metal cabinets to it with Velcro.

 

It will be cheaper if you use laminated pieces.

[kroe1]

We still have one in our beach house. The home is very small. We had to turn the breakfast nook into an office. To make it flow with the attached kitchen, we used the same cabinetry and quartz to make the rolling desk. It also doubles as an art table and is much easier to wipe up the messes than a wood table.