Custom Nightstand Watch Box

Rogan has a collection of some very nice watches that he felt his small watch box wasn’t doing the best job at displaying them. He had been looking around for a new one, but none were quite to the level that he wanted, and that’s where his inspiration to build his own began. His first thought was to build a table with a glass top. While I was on board, I pointed out one, he didn’t have enough watches to fill the length of a table with, and two, the custom glass to put on the top would be as expensive as buying some of the pricier watch boxes he was looking at. Going back to the drawing board, we thought about making a nightstand. It would be big enough to hold 12 watches in and small enough to buy the glass. Not to mention it fits in an apartment nicely as well.

So he had decided, a nightstand it was, and so the research and work began. I was recruited on the help with the process, because we decided to make two to have a matching set when we move in together after graduation. Our first step was finding the blue prints for the nightstands. We found some that could include a glass top, was in our budget, and at our skill level. We found them from www.diypete.com. The blueprints were overall a great tool to have, although we discovered a few holes in the descriptions given that left us making things up on the fly. In addition, it is great for beginners, but there were some wood working must knows that weren’t included in descriptions. For example, being the newbies we were, we didn’t know that most blades on a table saw took up about an 1/8″ when cutting, so we had to redraw all of our lines before cutting.

After we found the blueprints, we needed to decide on which wood to use. We ended up using pine, and that has been our lumber of choice from there on out. The biggest reason is price and color. Pine is the most inexpensive lumber out there and resists warping overtime compared to other lumber. It is great for pretty much anything you would need! In addition, pine is such a light color that it is like using a blank canvas when staining.

Next we needed to get all of our tools. We didn’t even own a hammer the two of us, so we had a lot of investing to do on that end. While it was expensive upfront to purchase everything, in the long run it has saved us so much money with all the projects we have done. For this particular project we need a miter saw, table saw, kreg jig, kreg screws, orbital sander, measuring tape, speed square, and a level. The miter saw we borrowed from my dad since we were working in his garage, and at the time we went over to a family friends to use his table saw. In the process we learned how to use a table and ended up purchasing one in an auction a month later for $75 (a major deal!).

We had the blue prints, the wood, and the tools all that was left to do was follow each step! We began by marking out every cut that we had to make on all the boards. As I mentioned though, we didn’t take into account the 1/8″ blade, so we had to remake every measurement while at our family friend’s house. Thankfully he didn’t mind, and taught us a lot in the process. A helpful tip, after making each cut we labeled them A, B, C, etc. to keep track of what attaches where.

Making the cuts was the hardest/longest part, the rest fell into place. Like I said, the blue prints from DIY Pete were great, but there were a few things we felt needed better or further description on how to do, so finding a more detailed blue print may be more helpful if you are a beginner. We assembled one nightstand first rather than doing each step twice, so if we made mistakes along the way we would know what to fix for the second one. After making the stand, and the drawer, we attached the drawer with a soft close pull and used the same $3.36 gold drawer pulls as my dresser and nightstand.

The next step was sanding down the wood and staining. If you purchase premium pine, like we did accidentally, there really is no reason to sand it down. We ended up using the color Espresso by Minwax as the stain and applied two coats. We finished with a few coats of a polyeurithaine to prevent any potential water damage from drinks and put the glass on top.

We purchased our glass with a 1/4″ in thickness and a beveled edge. It hangs off the sides only an 1/8″ all the way around to save on space and keep to the geometric shape of the nightstand. The glass has held up nicely over time and doesn’t require as much cleaning as one may think.

Rogan ordered some burlap watch pillows from amazon and made the watch slots out of a small pine piece. He made two long pieces shown above to lay vertically and cut 9 small piece to lay horizontally in the drawer. He just used wood glue to glue it all together and slid it into the drawer. I left mine open and use it for notebook storage and small items like chapstick and headphones.

These nightstands have been an absolute dream to have. They are very functional, fit in any space, and it was so easy to customize to us! Highly recommend taking on a project like this to add to a room. It is fun to brag to friends when they come over that you built that too!