I have planned on making a living room table following the same design as bench I made for the entry. You can see the details on the bench here.

I think it’s only fair to point out the reason I make “rustic” pieces — it’s because I don’t have the tools or the know-how to produce a finely crafted piece of furniture. Rustic fits me and my style better anyway.

In designing it I had to start with the top and then back into the measurements for everything else. I wanted the top to be between 32-34” square. I decided on 2 x 6’s for the top since six 5.5” boards would total 33”. No other dimension lumber seemed to work out right.

Once I had the top size and determined the desired overhang of the top on the base I could start designing the base. Based on the couch and chair the table would be sitting next to I decided on 22” legs so the top of the table would be 23 ½” high. There’s a wide range of acceptable heights for living room tables so I picked what seemed like the perfect height for my furniture.

By the way – 2 untreated 8 foot 4 x 4’s were enough for the bench legs in the entry and these table legs with a small piece left over.

 

Assembly

Same basic assembly as the bench. I am not gutsy enough to cut all pieces in advance. I prefer to cut things as I go so I can measure and make sure the exact size of the piece I need.

I made a mistake with the supports and didn’t realize it until it was too late – the glue had already set up and I wasn’t going to rip it apart. I added an additional board so I would have an additional board to connect the top to. See the boo boo? The 2 boards that are flush with the bottom of the apron were supposed to be flush with the top so I added on top running perpendicular to them. Oh well — worse things could have happened. I’m still finding woodworking to be an adventure fraught with lots of mistakes.

After cutting the 2 x 6 boards for the top I glued and screwed them together using pocket hole screws. I’m still working on getting comfortable with my Harbor Freight pocket hole jig and so far I am so glad I did NOT spend the money to get a Kreg. The HF jig is definitely one of their products and is far from a piece of junk — which I believe is reflected in the fact they never really put it on sale, just a couple of dollars off.

Applying finish

I decided to leave the top and the base separate for finishing and would attach the top after 30 days of drying time. I used water based poly on the bench and decided on oil base for the table since glasses might drip on it and I wanted the most durable finish possible.

I really wanted the top to be nearly perfect so I did some experimenting with methods of applying the poly. You can read about that here. I am really happy with how the satin poly turned out. It’s so nice I will be proud to have the table in my living room.

 

Finished table

That’s all I have until the end of the 30 day drying period. I will attach the top to the base and get placed in the living and add more pictures of the finished DIY rustic living room table then. See you in 30!

In the meantime I’ll be trying to figure out what I want to do as far as a lamp for the new table.