welcome back! today i’m going to make a japanese-stylebed. these beds are lower than western ones, with the mattress embedded in a wooden frame. i’ve tried to come up with a design thatwould be easy to make using plywood, although other kinds of wooden sheets could also be used. besides, this design is easy to assemble and disassemble, quite convenient if we want to move. i’ve designed two types of bed. this one is meant to be adapted to a common metal bed frame which you can find in any store. as you can see, the bed frame rests on these four corners which, in turn, join all the pieces.
the other bed design is of the same size. however, for this design we’ll use a homemadeplywood frame. in this video i’ll show you how i made thefirst of the two models, although both beds have similar makes. by changing the length of some pieces we canadapt this design to any bed size. now let’s take a look at how i made it. this time around, in order to save time i’veordered some pre-cut pieces from the same warehouse where i bought the board, sincethe parts are quite large. i’ll start by cutting these pieces at anangle.
they’ll be used to make the headboard thicker. i’ll also machine this rebate to work aroundthe floor plinth. i’ll also glue these pieces together, ontowhich i will later screw the bed side rails. now i glue the three upper side rails togetherto make them thicker. i machine these pieces like this and put themin place with glue. i sand these parts now that it’s easierand screw the bed side rails in like this. now i can start assembling the bed. i cut these two pieces in half to make foursupports for the bed frame. first i screw this one onto the side rails,keeping it 1mm away from the edge.
i remove the piece and then screw it ontothe headboard. this way, when screwing it back on, the screwswill put pressure and the joint between the side rail and the headboard will be tighter. i’ll use the same system for the back. i’ve numbered all the corners to make futureassemblies easier. with these last screws i finish putting thebed together. now it’s time to set up the nightstands. i glue these parts together and add a littlesalt to stop them from moving due to the glue’s viscosity. once the glue is dry, i sand the inner partnow that it’s easier
and continue assembling the nightstands. i finish sanding all the pieces that makeup the bed and apply three coats of satin water-based varnish. i’m going to put everything back togetherat the workshop to see what the finished bed looks like. i love how the edge of the plywood looks. of course, we could apply some dye to change the color, but i like the natural look of birch wood.