DIY MDF Bench

DIY, Furniture

I needed a simple bench for banquette seating in my dining room and I couldn’t find one that would work with my dining room table so I thought it would be fun to make one out of 3/4″ MDF. It surprisingly simple to build and it’s easy to customize to whatever size you need!

Materials you will need: I used 1 x 4’x8′ sheet of 3/4″ MDF because I needed the rest of the MDF for another project but you can fit the pieces for the bench in 2 x 2’x4′ sheets ($25) and the lattice was about $5 so that’s $30 for the materials. I had all the pieces cut at the hardware store and I already had the primer, paint, and screws on hand.

I’ll outline the main steps to make the bench below, and you can also see how I made the entire bench in this video.

Step 1: Attach the legs to the top

I put glue on the top edge of the leg and used corner clamps to hold it to the top. I drilled pilot holes to prevent splitting and screwed the pieces together, sinking the screw heads below the surface.

Step 2: Attach the back piece

I screwed in place the back piece flush with the top and the legs, following the same steps as for the legs.

Step 3: Attach the front piece

To have more support at the front of the bench, I glued together 2 MDF pieces to make one thicker piece, using clamps to make sure they bonded very well together.

I wanted the front piece to be recessed by about 1 inch so I used a combination square to mark the location of the front piece on the inside of the legs, making it easy to slide the front piece in the right spot.

I added glue to the edge and clamped it, then I screwed it into place from the top and the side, making sure to avoid the screw that was already there from joining the top to the legs.

Step 4: Add decorative molding

To give a little bit more interest to the sides of the bench, I added decorative molding made with 1 1/4″ lattice. I used a combination square to mark the location of the top piece of lattice, and I also marked the middle of the lattice piece, making it easy to nail exactly in the right spot. I pre-nailed the nails into the lattice to save my fingers!

Step 5: Prep the bench for painting

I filled in the screw heads with wood filler and sanded that down. To give a nice finish to the edges, I brushed them with wood glue diluted with a bit of water, waited for that to dry and sanded it down. I repeated that a couple of times until the edges were nice and smooth. This prevents the paint from getting sucked into the edges and leaves a nice smooth surface for painting.

Step 6: Paint the bench

I primed the bench and then painted it with a couple of coats of paint and voila, a finished bench! You can see the entire building process for the bench in this video, including how I made the no-sew cushion to make my bench more comfortable.

4 Comments

  1. MRE415

    How much weight do you think this can feasibly support? Is there any way to make it sturdier?

    Reply
    • Isabelle

      Well, I’ve had people that weight about 200 lbs sit on it without any problems. You could always another cross piece at the bottom connecting the 2 sides for extra strength.

      Reply
  2. Lee

    Is this screwed into the wall to keep firm in place? If not, do you have suggestions on how to hide the support underneath?

    Reply
    • Isabelle

      The bench isn’t screwed into the wall, the panel above it is. Not sure what support you are referring to?

      Reply

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