Stephen's Kid

 My buddy Stephen at work wanted to get a loft bed with a desk and some shelves for his daughter, when suddenly he realized "hey, I know somebody who builds those things and I can get exactly what I want". So we talked through the design some, I looked at the cost for adding the desk & shelves and I was off to the races. Unfortunately, Stephen also had to have surgery on his back, but a different surgery and a different part of the spine, but he was very understanding when my back pain put his 2 week build into more like a 3 month build. Still, I think it fits in to one blog post. It's a full-size loft bed.

One loft bed, some assembly required

Rough cut is getting there

Supports are assembled and everything is sanded

Assembled the frame

Building beds on a hot summer day

Starting to assemble

Now with all 6 supports, the ladder, and the desktop

Added the safety rail up top

My work setup, complete with box fan (did I mention hot?)

Added the shelves

Woodworking is done

Primed, and I added a brace on the back side

First, I rough cut all of my lumber for this basic setup. Assembly for the supports and the box was next, then everything got initial sanding and assembled on the deck. The spacer for the middle supports had to be the width I had for the desk, I used a 1x10 for that, then put ladder steps on the outside. Once that was all assembled (and I cut the 45* angle braces) I added the safety rail and a top rail mitered at the corners. Even after all of that, it still racked forward/backward some so I added that other brace on the end. In the end, it gives the girl something to decorate, and she thought it was a trip. Here's the finished product, installed in the house:

The customer loved it, my buddy was very happy with the finished product and (most importantly) his kid was absolutely ecstatic. That's what I like.