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#1 ·
Introduction

This series of blog posts describes a modern computer desk I started building recently.

A few months ago, my wife and I decided to replace our old Sauder (knock-down furniture) executive-style desk with something newer and a bit smaller. After a lot of research and SketchUp modeling, we settled on something similar to desks designed by Milo Baughman and others likely inspired by him and his contemporaries.

Our design includes these elements:
  • Simple, clean lines.
  • Waterfall grain pattern (mitered corners, where the wood grain flows up one side of the cabinet, across the top, and down the other side).
  • Three full-extension drawers to maximize storage in a small cabinet.
  • A finished back in case we decided to place the desk out in the room.
  • Cable management to reduce clutter.
  • Open framed legs.

For the cabinet wood, we chose quartersawn American Sycamore. We found some interesting, beautiful boards at a local lumberyard. The wood is full of character, and parts of the grain resemble lacewood (or snakeskin).

Here are some renderings of our final design.

Furniture Table Rectangle Wood Wood stain


Table Furniture Rectangle Outdoor furniture Outdoor bench


Furniture Table Outdoor table Outdoor furniture Rectangle


Upon starting this project, my main concerns related to the mitered cabinet corners and waterfall grain, as well as with working with solid wood in general. (Most of my experience is with MDF and veneer, and MDF is nice and flat.) As this blog series progresses, I'll highlight the problems I encountered and describe how I dealt with them.

Before I start to cover the actual construction, I'll present some alternate leg designs.
 

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#2 ·
Introduction

This series of blog posts describes a modern computer desk I started building recently.

A few months ago, my wife and I decided to replace our old Sauder (knock-down furniture) executive-style desk with something newer and a bit smaller. After a lot of research and SketchUp modeling, we settled on something similar to desks designed by Milo Baughman and others likely inspired by him and his contemporaries.

Our design includes these elements:
  • Simple, clean lines.
  • Waterfall grain pattern (mitered corners, where the wood grain flows up one side of the cabinet, across the top, and down the other side).
  • Three full-extension drawers to maximize storage in a small cabinet.
  • A finished back in case we decided to place the desk out in the room.
  • Cable management to reduce clutter.
  • Open framed legs.

For the cabinet wood, we chose quartersawn American Sycamore. We found some interesting, beautiful boards at a local lumberyard. The wood is full of character, and parts of the grain resemble lacewood (or snakeskin).

Here are some renderings of our final design.

Furniture Table Rectangle Wood Wood stain


Table Furniture Rectangle Outdoor furniture Outdoor bench


Furniture Table Outdoor table Outdoor furniture Rectangle


Upon starting this project, my main concerns related to the mitered cabinet corners and waterfall grain, as well as with working with solid wood in general. (Most of my experience is with MDF and veneer, and MDF is nice and flat.) As this blog series progresses, I'll highlight the problems I encountered and describe how I dealt with them.

Before I start to cover the actual construction, I'll present some alternate leg designs.
Not MCM to my eye, FWIW.
 

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#3 ·
Introduction

This series of blog posts describes a modern computer desk I started building recently.

A few months ago, my wife and I decided to replace our old Sauder (knock-down furniture) executive-style desk with something newer and a bit smaller. After a lot of research and SketchUp modeling, we settled on something similar to desks designed by Milo Baughman and others likely inspired by him and his contemporaries.

Our design includes these elements:
  • Simple, clean lines.
  • Waterfall grain pattern (mitered corners, where the wood grain flows up one side of the cabinet, across the top, and down the other side).
  • Three full-extension drawers to maximize storage in a small cabinet.
  • A finished back in case we decided to place the desk out in the room.
  • Cable management to reduce clutter.
  • Open framed legs.

For the cabinet wood, we chose quartersawn American Sycamore. We found some interesting, beautiful boards at a local lumberyard. The wood is full of character, and parts of the grain resemble lacewood (or snakeskin).

Here are some renderings of our final design.

Furniture Table Rectangle Wood Wood stain


Table Furniture Rectangle Outdoor furniture Outdoor bench


Furniture Table Outdoor table Outdoor furniture Rectangle


Upon starting this project, my main concerns related to the mitered cabinet corners and waterfall grain, as well as with working with solid wood in general. (Most of my experience is with MDF and veneer, and MDF is nice and flat.) As this blog series progresses, I'll highlight the problems I encountered and describe how I dealt with them.

Before I start to cover the actual construction, I'll present some alternate leg designs.
Thanks for your comment, gargey. I'll admit to not knowing the finer details of MCM, and I certainly do not want to misuse any terminology. So I just drop the "mid-century" part to avoid any confusion or contention.
 

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#4 ·
Leg Alternatives

After much searching on Google and Pinterest, we settled on Big Craftsman steel table legs by Symmetry Hardware of Portland, Oregon.

As I write this, the legs are on order, but they should look like this rendering.

Furniture Table Rectangle Wood Outdoor furniture


It took us a long time to find the perfect legs. I modeled several options, and I thought I'd show some of them in case it helps any other prospective desk or table builders.

Square rectangular tube legs (thick on top):
Furniture Table Rectangle Outdoor furniture Wood


Bent metal bar legs, also rectangular (Big 90 legs, also from Symmetry Hardware):
Furniture Table Rectangle Wood Outdoor furniture


Half-tapered legs:
Furniture Table Rectangle Wood Outdoor furniture


Trapezoidal legs:
Table Rectangle Wood Desk Outdoor furniture


Trapezoidal legs with Z-braces:
Furniture Table Rectangle Wood Outdoor furniture


Bracket legs:
Table Desk Outdoor furniture Rectangle Outdoor table


In addition to these leg designs, we also played around with their positions on the cabinet. Some legs looked better inset from the sides, while others looked better flush (or nearly so) with the sides. Paralysis by analysis was a definite risk.

I'll start covering the actual desk construction in the next post.
 

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#5 ·
Gluing up the top/side and bottom panels

The sycamore boards I bought varied in width from about 6 to 11 inches, so I needed to edge-glue them to create the 24-inch wide panels for the top, bottom, and sides of the case. I know that this process is old hat to many woodworkers here, but it's new to me.

Brown Wood Rectangle Fixture Flooring


Brown Table Rectangle Wood Flooring


After doing some research, I cut three sets of clamping cauls from some scrap leftover from my workbench project. I didn't curve them, but left them straight. Some test clamps were mostly, but not completely, satisfactory. Because my boards weren't perfectly flat, the board edges weren't perfectly flush. (Maybe I needed more than three sets of cauls given the 5-and-a-half-foot board lengths.)

I don't have a biscuit joiner, but I do have a cheap doweling jig, so I decided to use dowels spaced every six inches or so to better align the boards. Test fits were very promising, so I ended up using glue, dowels, and cauls.

Wood Composite material Radial arm saw Engineering Machine


Property Wood Table Flooring Floor


I let the squeezed-out glue dry to the point where it was like soft rubber, then used an old chisel to scrape it off. That also worked well, as I didn't have any problems when I applied the finish later.

The resulting panels were pretty flat, and I was able to hand-sand the glued edges to eliminate any high spots. (I made a point of saving the sanding dust, because I knew I'd need it to fill some gaps later on.)

Now I was ready to move on to the next step-cutting the bevels for the mitered case corners.
 

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#6 ·
Cutting the bevels for the mitered case corners

The scariest part of building this desk was making the 45-degree bevel cuts across the 24" wide top/side and bottom panels. In particular, if I messed up any of the cuts on the former, I would ruin the top and both sides in one shot.

I have a nice crosscut sled for my table saw, but it will accommodate stock up to only 21" wide, so it wasn't an option. I didn't feel like making a special sled. I'd love to have a Festool track saw, but I couldn't justify the expense. My only option was my Porter Cable circular saw.

With a circular saw, the cleanest part of the cut is the underside, but I wanted to make my cuts from the top side of the panel to keep the top edge as true as possible. (If the blade fluttered, etc., there might be some wobble on the inside edges, but it wouldn't be visible after assembly.)

I have a 48" sawboard for making rough cuts in MDF and plywood sheets. I decided to sacrifice it to convert it to a bevel-cutting sawboard. That was easy-just tilt the saw blade and run it across the sawboard. With this new sawboard, I could cut from the top. The sawboard would minimize tear-out on the top side.

To make each cut, I carefully positioned the sawboard using speed squares on each end, clamped the sawboard and panel to my workbench (with scrap between the bench and panel to leave room for the blade). Then I took a deep breath and made the cut very slowly.

Here's how everything looked right after I made the first cut.
Wood Table Floor Flooring Wood stain


Here's how the top and bottom lined up after I finished. The reason for the clamp in the first photo is that the top panel was twisted a bit on one corner. (That also explains why I clamped everything to my workbench before cutting-I didn't want that twist to affect the cut.)

Wood Tool Safety glove Automotive exterior Aircraft


Rectangle Wood Floor Flooring Hardwood


The two top-panel cutoffs formed the sides. I used my table saw to rip the other 45-degree bevels in the side. That part was easy and drama-free.

This photo shows the amount of twist in the top. Aside from this corner, the rest of the panel was flat on the bench.

Wood Rectangle Table Flooring Wood stain


I'd have to deal with that twist when I assembled the case.
 

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#7 ·
Assembling the case

In my previous post, I mentioned that cutting the bevels was the scariest part of this project. The second scariest part was assembling the case so the mitered corners looked nice.

The issue was alignment. I couldn't use splines to align the edges (unless they were blind). I don't have a biscuit joiner, so biscuits weren't an option. With my dowel jig, I'd never align dowel holes well enough to make things work.

In the end, I decided to sacrifice a tiny bit of drawer width. I already needed to cut two 3 1/2" tall dividers to support the three drawers. If I cut two more to act as inner sides, I could glue the beveled (outer and visible) sides to them. That would address the twist in the top, and then the miter joints would be purely cosmetic.

To deal with wood movement, I made the dividers and inner sides such that the wood grain was vertical. This way, all panels would expand and contract in the front-to-back direction. I had to edge-glue more boards to make a short panel and cross cut the dividers and inner sides from it.

Wood Floor Flooring Creative arts Hardwood


After cutting the dividers to size, I used a 2" Forstner bit to drill the cable management holes. I also pre-drilled the pilot holes for the drawer slides. (I knew I didn't want to deal with the headache of drilling those holes after assembly.)

To attach the dividers and inner sides, I pulled out my trusty Kreg pocket hole jig. I used pocket holes and screws to attach all four pieces to the inverted top panel.

Wood Hardwood Gas Composite material Plywood


To keep the dividers from sliding when I drove the pocket screws (I also used glue), I clamped scrap boards on both sides.

Wood Flooring Floor Creative arts Wood stain


Then I flipped that assembly over, placing it on the bottom panel. I could use pocket screws on the inner sides, but not for the dividers. For them, I used counterbored screws through the panel.

Table Wood Flooring Floor Material property


Finally, I glued the actual sides to the inner sides. The result was not as good as I had hoped, but it was okay. There were definite gaps (around 1/32" or so) at the corners, but I thought I could deal with them prior to finishing.

Table Rectangle Wood Flooring Floor


Table Wood Rectangle Beige Wood stain
 

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#8 ·
Filling the gaps in the mitered case corners

The gaps in the case corners was a source of wounded pride, but they were really easy to address using sawdust and glue. (I also considered burnishing, but reserved that for a backup plan. Fortunately, I didn't need it.)

Table Wood Rectangle Wood stain Floor


I started by taping both sides of the gap to keep glue off the surfaces.
Wood Rectangle Hardwood Wood stain Composite material


Then I filled the gap with white glue.
Wood Rectangle Wood stain Hardwood Table


Next, I dusted the glue with wood dust and pressed it into the gap with my fingers.
Wood Hardwood Wood stain Electric blue Composite material


Finally, I rubbed across the gap with my finger to remove any excess glue/dust mixture and removed the tape.
Table Wood Rectangle Floor Wood stain


The glue/dust mixture contracted slightly as it dried, so I repeated the procedure.

I then did the same thing for any gaps on the edges of the panels.
Wood Table Rectangle Grey Floor


Wood Rectangle Wood stain Flooring Hardwood


I'm getting ahead of myself, but I worried that the finish (danish oil) might highlight the fill, but a quick test showed that everything would be okay.

With the case complete, next up was the back panel.
 

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#9 ·
Filling the gaps in the mitered case corners

The gaps in the case corners was a source of wounded pride, but they were really easy to address using sawdust and glue. (I also considered burnishing, but reserved that for a backup plan. Fortunately, I didn't need it.)

Table Wood Rectangle Wood stain Floor


I started by taping both sides of the gap to keep glue off the surfaces.
Wood Rectangle Hardwood Wood stain Composite material


Then I filled the gap with white glue.
Wood Rectangle Wood stain Hardwood Table


Next, I dusted the glue with wood dust and pressed it into the gap with my fingers.
Wood Hardwood Wood stain Electric blue Composite material


Finally, I rubbed across the gap with my finger to remove any excess glue/dust mixture and removed the tape.
Table Wood Rectangle Floor Wood stain


The glue/dust mixture contracted slightly as it dried, so I repeated the procedure.

I then did the same thing for any gaps on the edges of the panels.
Wood Table Rectangle Grey Floor


Wood Rectangle Wood stain Flooring Hardwood


I'm getting ahead of myself, but I worried that the finish (danish oil) might highlight the fill, but a quick test showed that everything would be okay.

With the case complete, next up was the back panel.
The 45 degree miter is truly my Achilles heel. Sometimes they come out perfect, sometimes not so good. I've used this method and many others and it does work. Nice recovery! Another method I use for repair is keep those super thin cut offs. Sometimes they will fill the gap just right. With a sanding they come out real nice.
 

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#11 ·
Adding the removable back panel

Do you know how "easy" tasks sometimes turn out to be difficult, and vice-versa? Here's one case where the former definitely occurred.

The cabinet's back panel is just a simple slab of wood 3 1/2" high with a 3/8" indentation routed across the top (aside from 6" on either side) to form a slot for cables exiting the cabinet. At least that's what it was supposed to be…

I had planned to cut the back panel and drawer faces from a single 8" board. When I ripped that board in half, I ran into two problems. First, my wife disliked the half I intended to use for the drawers. (It has some charcoal-like mineral stains that look like smudges. I liked it, but she didn't.) Second, that half of the board twisted after I cut it, and I couldn't think of any good way to flatten it. So I had to scrap that half of the board and reserve the other for the drawer faces. Now I needed a new back.

The only other usable piece of wood I had left was a 3" wide cutoff from the back edge of the top panel. But it too had a problem. It wasn't twisted, but had a pronounced bow. If I placed it face-down on my bench, the ends touched, but the center was about 3/8" off the bench. The lumber yard is about 45 minutes away, and I really didn't feel like driving out there to buy a new piece.

After stewing for a while, I had an idea. If I cut the board in half thickness-wise, I could glue the halves back together (with one flipped upside down) to cancel out the stress causing the bow. At this point, I really wished I had a band saw, but I don't. Fortunately, my table saw has the capacity to make the cut. I was able to clamp a board parallel to the fence on the feed side of the blade to keep the bowed board as straight as possible as I made the cut. I fed the wood slowly and was able to make the cut.

It turns out that most of the stress was on one side of the board. One of the new, thin boards was nearly flat, while the other was more bowed than before.

Table Wood Floor Wood stain Flooring


The good thing is that the pieces were now so thin that it took almost no pressure to flatten the bow. When I glued the two halves back together (even though I stupidly forgot to flip one over), the resulting board was close to flat.

Table Wood Floor Flooring Rectangle


Now my only problem was that my new back panel was too short (just over 3" instead of 3 1/2"). But I solved that problem by gluing short, thin strips to both ends of the top edge. That worked out fine. I didn't have to route out the indentation; the strips created it for me.

With all of that done, I now had my back panel. I just needed to round off the inside edges to make it easier to insert and remove. I also needed a way to attach the panel to the case so it was secure, but removable, with no visible fasteners. I've used small magnets for speaker grills before, so I decided to use them here.

I ordered a set of 3/8-inch diameter by 1/8-inch thick neodymium disc magnets from totalElement.com. I used 16 magnets in all: two in the back edge of each inner case side and divider, plus matching ones in the back panel itself. Each magnet sits in a shallow hole from a 3/8" Forstner bit, glued with epoxy.

Table Wood Natural material Rectangle Wood stain


Wood Table Rectangle Drawer Wood stain


These magnets are strong! They hold the panel in place very securely. I didn't need to use as many as I did, but I'll never worry about the panel accidentally falling out (and the slight amount of remaining bow is a total non-issue). Removing it is slightly inconvenient, but I can reach my fingers through the 2" cable management holes in the bottom panel and press the panel outward far enough to grab it.

The end result is very clean. (Note: this photo is post-finishing. I actually installed the magnets after finishing, but thought it was better to describe everything about the back panel here.)
Table Wood Rectangle Plant Interior design


Using the resawn panel had another benefit. I had not planned on insetting the back panel, but using a thinner panel (about 5/8" thick instead of 3/4") created an inset, and I think it looks better that way (and the shadow line hides the fact that the panel is not perfectly centered due to my magnet holes being slightly mis-positioned).

The next task was building the drawers.
 

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#12 ·
Building the drawers

I have a confession to make. I'm a lazy drawer box builder. I have the utmost respect for those who create heirloom-quality dovetailed drawers, but I'm not likely to join their ranks. I use 1/2" plywood (birch for this project) for the sides, 1/4" plywood for the bottoms, and pocket screws and glue for joinery. I do route a 1/4" square slot 1/4" from the bottom edge of each side in which to float the bottom, but that's as fancy as I get.

I used two of my clamping cauls as right-angle braces when driving the screws.

Wood Floor Flooring Hardwood Wood stain


Rectangle Wood Floor Flooring Drawer


I like Accuride 3832 full-extension drawer slides, and I used 18" ones for this desk. Because I pre-drilled pilot holes in the dividers and inner sides before assembling the case, installing the slides was easy.

Wood Wood stain Floor Hardwood Flooring


The drawer faces took more care. I cut all three faces from the same board. I started by ripping the board to the exact height of the case's drawer cavities. Then I crosscut the center face to match the divider-to-divider distance, and then cut the left and right faces to fill the remaining openings. At this point, I had three faces that completely filled the front of the case. I would need to trim those faces to create small gaps.

I wasn't sure how large the gaps between the drawer faces and the case, and between the drawers, should be. I found one article on the web that mentioned using pennies as spacers to create 1/16" gaps, so I decided to give that a try. That worked well. I used pennies to adjust my table saw's fence and crosscut stop block when trimming the edges.

At this point, I'm taking liberties with the construction sequence again. I added the drawer faces after finishing.

With that done, all that remained was attaching the faces to the drawer boxes. Before installing the drawers, I drilled two slightly oversized holes in the front of each drawer box. To position the faces, I used double-sided carpet tape on the drawer boxes and used the pennies again to position the faces. The tape is quite strong, and it held the faces in place as I carefully opened (by pushing from the back) and removed the drawers, then drove screws through the two holes. I then removed the screws and tape and re-drove the screws. The oversized holes let me make slight adjustments after I reinstalled the drawers.

Table Furniture Product Wood Rectangle


Wood Rectangle Window Table Floor


Table Furniture Wood Rectangle Wood stain


Brown Rectangle Wood Flooring Floor


Next, I'll describe how I finished the cabinet.
 

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#13 ·
Applying the finish

We wanted a smooth, non-shiny finish, so Danish oil (Watco natural) fit the bill.

Before applying the oil, I sanded all surfaces using progressively finer grits, ending with 280 grit.

To apply the oil, I followed the procedure in the YouTube video How to Apply Danish Oil, by Fabian's Tiny Workshop. He demonstrates the process very clearly. The only thing I did differently was apply the oil with a gray abrasive pad (similar to gray Scotch-Brite, I think) instead of a paper towel. That let me skip wet sanding with 600 grit sandpaper because I smoothed the surface with each application.

Here's the unfinished case.
Wood Rectangle Wood stain Hardwood Composite material


Here it is after the first application of oil (still wet).
Wood Rectangle Table Wood stain Hardwood


I applied four "coats" before stopping. Here are a few in-progress photos.

Wood Rectangle Wood stain Composite material Hardwood


Brown Wood Flooring Tree Floor


Now that the finish has cured, it's slightly lighter and duller, as it appears in this photo of the bottom. But it has a slight glow, which is what we wanted.
Table Furniture Wood Lighting Floor


When I'm absolutely certain I won't need another application, I may follow up with paste wax.

At this point, the desk is almost complete. All that's left are the drawer knobs and legs.
 

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#14 ·
Final touches: drawer knobs and legs

Finding the right drawer knobs was almost as hard as finding the legs. We started out looking for something unique in color/material/texture (colored metal, crystal, art glass, polished stone, etc.) or form (rectangular, pyramidal, etc.) The number of available choices is staggering. In the end, we circled back to something small (to better fit the scale of the narrow drawers), with modern, clean lines that match the rest of the desk: Omnia Hardware Ultima II 9035 knobs that my wife found online. They come in three sizes, from 1" diameter up to 1 1/2", and in various finishes. The 1" satin nickel ones are perfect for us.

Furniture Wood Table Drawer Chest of drawers


Table Furniture Cabinetry Wood Rectangle


I ordered the legs ("Big Craftsman" with a brushed finish) from Symmetry Hardware of Portland, Oregon. I'm very happy with them. They're well-finished, sturdy, and heavy (about 25 pounds each). They're easy to install, because each leg has a 5" wide mounting plate with eight slots. (The slots allow for wood movement.) I used 1" long, 1/4" lag screws. I was a little wary of using such short screws (Symmetry Hardware typically includes 1 1/4" long screws) and considered using through holes and bolts, but my worries were unfounded. The desk is very solid, with no side-to-side racking.

Table Wood Flooring Floor Wood stain


Attaching the legs was supposed to be the last step in this project. However, a final decision about the desk's placement created an opportunity for an extra feature: a small shelf to hold (and hide) our cable modem and wireless router. I wrote one final blog post about that.
 

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#15 ·
Final touches: drawer knobs and legs

Finding the right drawer knobs was almost as hard as finding the legs. We started out looking for something unique in color/material/texture (colored metal, crystal, art glass, polished stone, etc.) or form (rectangular, pyramidal, etc.) The number of available choices is staggering. In the end, we circled back to something small (to better fit the scale of the narrow drawers), with modern, clean lines that match the rest of the desk: Omnia Hardware Ultima II 9035 knobs that my wife found online. They come in three sizes, from 1" diameter up to 1 1/2", and in various finishes. The 1" satin nickel ones are perfect for us.

Furniture Wood Table Drawer Chest of drawers


Table Furniture Cabinetry Wood Rectangle


I ordered the legs ("Big Craftsman" with a brushed finish) from Symmetry Hardware of Portland, Oregon. I'm very happy with them. They're well-finished, sturdy, and heavy (about 25 pounds each). They're easy to install, because each leg has a 5" wide mounting plate with eight slots. (The slots allow for wood movement.) I used 1" long, 1/4" lag screws. I was a little wary of using such short screws (Symmetry Hardware typically includes 1 1/4" long screws) and considered using through holes and bolts, but my worries were unfounded. The desk is very solid, with no side-to-side racking.

Table Wood Flooring Floor Wood stain


Attaching the legs was supposed to be the last step in this project. However, a final decision about the desk's placement created an opportunity for an extra feature: a small shelf to hold (and hide) our cable modem and wireless router. I wrote one final blog post about that.
Very nice desk!
 

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#16 ·
Addendum: Modem/Router Shelf

When I started working on the desk, we weren't sure if we were going to place it out in the room (with its back visible) or against a wall. Ultimately, we decided on wall placement, and that led me to an addition: a small shelf tucked under the bottom rear of the desk to hold our cable modem and wireless router.

The shelf is simple. It's basically an 18" long by 8" wide by 3" high box with an open back and ventilation slots on the front and sides. The actual shelf is 1/4" luan with additional ventilation slots.

Here are the sides.
Table Rectangle Wood Bumper Flooring


Here's the bottom.
Outdoor bench Table Rectangle Wood Outdoor furniture


Here it is, ready to finish.
Ruler Wood Rectangle Office ruler Hardwood


Due to its low profile and narrow width, it's not visible from normal viewing angles. Here it is in the finished desk.

Table Furniture Peripheral Computer desk Output device


Wood Beam Wood stain Plank Hardwood


At this point, the desk is finally done. Thank you for reading my blog!
 

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