Lately, I've been trolling the list of craig for a suitable headboard for our guest bedroom. I wanted something simple but nice looking and above all, not too expensive. Baby Time is still a couple years away, but we didn't want to invest in "real" furniture when we're going to have to get rid of the bed that's in there at some point. Craigslist didn't have anything that was suitable, so we decided to follow the homemade arts-and-crafts project track instead.B was amenable--excited, even--to build a headboard, and we each started making plans in our heads. When it came time to compare notes, we both had different ideas about what to do and had trouble finding common ground.
We both wanted a picture-frame style headboard with fabric-covered plywood as its "picture." The idea was that you could re-cover the plywood at any time and have lots of flexibility to change the look of your headboard. However, B was picturing a very thin headboard, and I had in mind something more substantial, a la Pottery Barn. I thought that B's headboard design was going to be too lightweight to support itself, and B thought that my headboard was going to weigh hundreds of pounds.
While we tried to reach middle ground, B pointed out that we're both very independent thinkers, and neither of us takes on the drone/"I'll-do-whatever-you-say" role very well. We both want to have complete control over planning and doing, and we both are convinced that we are right. I agreed and told him that that was true, but in this instance, I was right, and he was wrong. I think that my argument only made his point stronger.
We decided to let a neutral third party decide what we should do, so we looked up headboard plans online. We realized that neutral third parties know a whole lot more about woodworking and building than we do, and we are totally unqualified to build even the simple wooden headboards that we found online. Back to square one.
Our original plan--before the picture frame excitement took over--was to make a simple fabric-covered headboard, which requires minimal tools and very little woodworking knowledge. We found a video tutorial online, made our plan and materials list, and set off for our local hardware and fabric stores.
We got 1/2" plywood and had the Lowe's guy cut it to the right size (major time saver) and 1x4 pine planks for the "feet" of the headboard. We also picked up a staple gun that fires both staples and brads (those little nails that the guy on Yankee Workshop is always talking about). B was very excited about the brad capability. I was more interested in why a nail is called a brad, but that is a mystery that will have to be solved some other time.
Our plan was to cover the plywood with quilt batting and then a white sheet, but when we got to the quilt store, we realized how thin the batting was and decided that one layer was not going to be enough. Instead, we got enough batting to make a king-sized quilt, which allowed us to put five layers of batting on the headboard. It's not pillow-level soft, but it feels a lot softer than wood.
Assembling the layers was pretty easy--B had a ball with the staple gun, which makes a satisfying, loud noise every time it goes off and has a bit of a recoil--sort of like playing a war game, except the result is redecoration rather than death and destruction. The batting got a bit thick toward the end, what with the five layers and all, but B and the staple gun got the job done.
The sheet that we used as the top fabric layer has stripes, which added a new level of difficulty for attaching the fabric--we had to make sure that they lined up correctly. The end result might not be perfect, but it's good enough.
The final step--attaching the legs--turned out to be the hardest. Our original plan was to attach the headboard to the bed frame, but B was having trouble getting the screws to stick in the plywood without going through to the other side. All of the batting was complicating matters, too. In the end, we decided to skip attaching the board to the frame, and we just nailed the legs toward the middle of the headboard, where the fabric is thinnest, and we are using the weight of the bed to keep the board standing up straight.
The new headboard has improved the look of our guest room dramatically. Now I feel inspired to continue the redecoration. New lighting, anyone?
