A few years ago I made a desk for my wife using only pallets. You can read the specifics here. She’s a collage artist and I wanted something unique that would fit her style. I’m very happy with how it turned out, and it’s been fun to watch photos of the table spread across social media.
But as pervasive as social media is, there’s something special about seeing your work in print. Kolaj Magazine just released their ninth issue in which they feature my wife and her collage work. As part of that feature there’s a full spread showing her studio space and the pallet table.
Most surprising to me, however, is that various people across the world created their own tables inspired by the one I built. Here are a few of those tables.
Simon Dewerson from France
Simon put some love and care into this table. It is gorgeous! He didn’t stick to just pallet wood and I think that’s a great idea. The table is 5’6″ by 2’6″ and uses 12 mm rods. Here’s what he had to say about his process and experience:
“I took a fair amount of time on the underside as I wanted it to be really solid and last. You can see from the photo how I did it—I don’t think this is how professional furniture makers do it but it worked for me. I spent the most time sanding the top and sides, also filling in any gaps with sawdust and wood glue as I went along. Now varnished and in use as a dinner table. Thanks to Jason for the great idea!”
Martin Wenzel from Austria
Martin put a lot of time into his table and it shows. He used reclaimed wood from pallets, clamped together with three threaded rods—but this produced flexing problems. He solved the issue by adding two beams along the underside. Due to the different heights of the wood on the underside, he had to add notches to various pieces to allow the beams to be fastened securely. His table is beautiful! Check out his photos and his process. You will see he designed very cool legs for his table. He ultimately decided against using them as they would have made the whole thing too busy—but they’re very cool nonetheless.
Bannockburn from Michigan
I only know him by his username on instructables.com, but he created a pallet wood tv console table that appears to follow my steps very closely. It has similar colors, the uneven bottom, and is assembled using threaded rods. But unlike me, he even made his table legs out of pallets. Nice!
Jerry from Texas
Jerry contacted me via Facebook to discuss the table he was building for his wife. (Jerry, I’ve lost your information. If you’d like this post to link to you in some way, let me know!) He decided to use wood glue instead of threaded rods to hold it all together. That did end up being a problem for him, but was easily remedied by adding additional braces under the table top. That worked well as all of his pieces have the same height, thus providing an even bottom side for bracing. It looks like the table was clamped tightly together, providing him with a very smooth table top. Jerry’s table was beautifully done.
John from Prague
Last but not least, we look at a table built by John from Prague. (John, contact me if you’d like a link in this post.) This was not made using pallets (at least not totally), and that adds a nice quality as the pieces have varying widths. This looks like a solid table. I like the metal supports for the threaded rods along the outer edges. I imagine that becomes necessary when you have a larger table like this one, which is just under 6′ x 3′. John said he’s using this as part of his “garden kitchen.” I don’t know what that is, but I’m very curious. Whatever the use, you can tell this is a quality table. Huge kudos to John.
I’d love to build a table for my own office one of these months. I have a partial plan in place should I ever find the time. But whether I get to it amid all the other potential projects and responsibilities, only time will tell. If that ever does happen, I’ll be sure to document it here. And if there’s anyone else who has built a piece based on this table design, I’d love to see it!
