Build Your Own Banquette

Apartment Therapy - Green did a post today about a home-made window seat. I took a look at the picture and thought, "That looks familiar....."



After building The World's Easiest Sofa, I still had the featherbed to find a new home for. We needed seating in the dining room, and I've always loved banquettes (I think because I love eating in restaurants so much), so it seemed a perfect match.

We used two pieces of MDF for the seat. We found a suitable piece in the scrap bin at our local Home Hardware and had them cut it to size for us (they did this for FREE - I love our local Home Hardware!)

We attached a batten to the wall (screwed into the studs) at the appropriate height(roughly 18 inches). Then on the front part of the seat, we attached threaded galvanized pipe. This was a good thing to use in our situation. I love the look of it and the threading allowed us to adjust the length somewhat. Because we live in an old building and the floor has some dips in it (the word "rollercoaster" comes to mind) we did have to shim one of the legs. In a newer house, that probably wouldn't be necessary.



After we maneuvred the pieces into place (this part is a two-person job), we screwed the seat to the battens and we were nearly there.

To make the seat cushion, I used the featherbed, cut in half across the width.

IMPORTANT: if you're going to cut a featherbed, or duvet in half, you need to stitch the new edges FIRST, or you'll end up with a room full of feathers (amazingly, I figured this out before I cut!). Do two lines of stitching, about an inch apart and then cut in between.

After that was done, I folded each piece in half and did a bit of hand-stitching to keep it all together.

This is a big job. You will swear a lot and wonder if it's worth it. Persevere - the end result is just so nice.

I covered my cushion in a huge tablecloth that I found at the thrift store and used some of the pillows from my collection for the back.

All plumped up for a dinner party, it looks almost formal, but once seated, you can moosh the cushions around for the most comfortable seating on earth.



As an added bonus, it hardly takes up any space at all!