I’ve recently been faced with a large, empty apartment, a budget, and about a week to make it feel like a home. Furnishing via Craig’s List had always been my plan, but with two living rooms? Oh, also, by the way, we can’t fit anything larger than the smallest loveseat up our stairwell. The one that did make it up here was the result of a 45 minute battle with geometry. The stairwell lost–and not without some wounds to show for it–but we weren’t about to invite another couch to war. Didn’t they have large pieces of furniture in the early 1900’s? What gives?

Anyhow, my sister and I were pondering our large-empty-space, low-budget problems (and recognizing that there was no possibility of solving either problem with big cheap couches) while sitting in the window seat of a downtown Providence Starbucks. Now, wait…we can bring materials up the stairwell… 12 cinder blocks and 32 square feet of particle board later the project had started.

Materials:
12 16″ long cinder blocks (6″x 8″x 16″) [$1.25 ea]
1 4′x 8′ sheet of particle board [$17.99]
64 sq ft of scrap carpeting foam [$30]
2 2′x 9′ pieces of upholstery foam [$10 ea]
17′ of upholstery fabric (54″ wide–pretty standard) [$11]
6 pieces of scrap cardboard (~22″x 8″ ea)

Tools:
Staple gun [$4]
Staples [$1.25]
Sewing machine (optional)
Scissors

Useful notes on supplies:
The listed equipment would be used to exactly duplicate what I have built. Use some math to convert to the space available for your window seat. The prices in brackets are what I paid for the above items. The cinder blocks, particle board, and carpeting foam were purchased at Home Depot. I would suggest eliminating the cost of the carpeting foam by going to a carpet store and asking for scrap pieces, as they do not need to be whole or new (though clean would be a bonus). You may be tempted to eliminate the use carpeting foam altogether, but I would warn against that as it really does add to the comfort of the bench, being a much denser foam than the upholstery foam. The upholstery foam is sold in those exact standard package sizes at Walmart, the fabric I bought was on sale (also at Walmart). You could use recycled fabric, or any kind of fabric really, as long as it is pretty durable and not too thin. It is also beneficial to have whole pieces of fabric (to fit the whole bench) to save time and eyesores. The staple gun was the second cheapest one at Walmart and worked just fine for its purpose. You could also rent one of these at Home Depot, but it’s probably not worth it.

Home Depot will cut your particle board into pieces for you. My pieces are 24″x 92″ and 24″x 76″. A 2′ width works well because of the standard upholstery foam size I found at Walmart and also allowed for efficient use of the 54″ wide fabric (24″ wide for benches + 16″ high for the skirt = 40″, which leaves 14″ for folding under and stapling)–though fortuitous, this was not planned but governed by the width of the particle board sheet being 4′ and the decision to just slice it in half.

Instructions:
1. Preparing.
–plan and measure the dimensions of your window seat.

–cut particle board (or have it cut) into desired dimensions.

–adjust material quantities for your specifications (2 cinder blocks for every 2.5′ or so, etc).

2. Foaming.
–attach one layer of carpeting foam to the top of the bench with a staple gun—flush to the edges of the particle board. (Sparsely stapled is okay: this step has no relevance to the durability of the final product.) Attaching this foam piecewise is fine, since you will be putting more foam on top of it; however, one big piece is probably easier to work with/staple.

–lay another layer of carpeting foam on top of the first. It is unlikely that you will be able to staple this on, but it will be sandwiched pretty well.

–cut the upholstery foam to length and lay it on top of the 2nd layer of carpeting foam. For rounded edges, leave 2” of foam hanging over the edge to be rounded. This layer is also secured only by the fabric on top of it.

–repeat for each piece of particle board

3. Upholstering.
–leaving 6″ on each edge, cut the fabric to the size of the bench (or, foamed piece of particle board at this step…).

–lay the fabric evenly on top of the foam–making sure that it overlaps every edge by at least 6″.

–flip the bench over. It is very important that the fabric remains taut and does not wrinkle during the flip; be extra careful here in order to achieve a tight fit (i.e. borrow a friend to help).

–choose a side of the board to start stapling (a long side to start is easier). Fold the fabric over onto the particle board and hold firmly in place.

–staple the fabric to the particle board. The staples should be an inch or two from the edge and about 6″ apart (see photo to right). Be careful to smooth the fabric prior to each time you staple to avoid wrinkles.

–at the corners of the bench, fold the fabric as if you were wrapping a present and continue stapling (see photo).

–when all the egdes have been stapled, flip the bench back over and admire (optional- you’re just going to flip the bench back over in the next step).

4. Skirting.
*Note: This is the only step that requires some actual (though minor) skill…and a sewing machine. If you don’t have a sewing machine (or a sewer) available, try using some iron-on device (such as Stitch Witchery) to make the seam.

–cut to length of desired skirt a 20″ wide piece of fabric (for 16″ high cinderblocks). *note: make sure to include the length of any corner/edge that you would like the skirt to hide. Cut the fabric to the length of the entire exposed edge of the bench.

–along one edge, fold 1″ of the fabric onto itself (with the good side showing on the fold–see photo, right) and sew a straight seam with a 1/2″ seam allowance.

–lay the (unsewn) edge of the fabic upside-down over the edge of the (inverted) bench that will face into the room. (such that it will hang down in front of the cinder blocks when stapled: see photo, right) Make sure to align fabric with bench so that 16″ of it will hang down in front of the bench when inverted.

–staple fabric at the very edge of the particle board (it’s full of glue and has no grain, so there is little chance of the bond failing); this way, the fabric will hang from the edge of the seat instead of an inch or two back, which would look pretty funny.

–repeat for each bench.

Your bench should now look something like this:

5. Heightening.
–cut 6 pieces of scrap cardboard to size (~22″x 8″ for this bench)

–decide where the cinder blocks should sit underneath the bench (about 2.5′ apart seems to work well to eliminate bowing when weight is added in between blocks) and set the cardboard in these places.

–place 2 cinder blocks at each end of every piece of cardboard.

–lift and invert bench(es) (four hands are much better than two in this step).

–set your new window seat into place, arrange the skirt to hide the cinder blocks, and admire.

*Note: The bottom picture on the right shows the arrangement of cinder blocks under my window seat. There is one set of blocks missing in the middle of the short bench.

6. Decorating.
–the comfort of your new window seat is increased exponentially with each added throw pillow. (However these are not included in the cost estimate above.)

Enjoy! Have a cup of coffee and read a magazine over there. Throw a party and watch, amazed, as everyone isn’t wandering around your place fruitlessly trying to find a place to sit. Build a simple coffee table to go with your new designer window seat—oh wait, that’s the next project. Stay tuned…