DIY Upholstered X-Bench | Free Plans

It’s the ladies turn on this upholstered X bench! Besides my Chicken wire Bulletin Board I have ZERO experience building. Yes, I watch my husband build, however, by no means does that make me anymore experienced than the average Joe, or shall I say Jane. So following some pretty awesome girls, hint hint Shanty2Chic, motto “Build like a Girl” I decided to give it a go. I picked out my design, had this AMAZING aerospace engineer I know draw up the plans and voilà! This upholstered X bench was built entirely by me with NO experience and NO help from my builder of a husband… though he did sit back and laugh at me a few times. Oh and by the way, this thing is built to last, its crazy sturdy and will take a ton of weight and abuse (which it has too in order to last around our house). Well, anyway, here’s a pictorial of my very first SOLO furniture build! Go me!

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Tools Required

Materials

1x 1 x 2 x 48″
3x 1 x 2 x 96″
1x 3/4″ x 17″ x 22″ Plywood (I used scrap)
3″ Foam Padding (17″x22″ required)
Batting
Fabric
Spray Adhesive
1-1/4″ Brad Nails (18-Gauge)
1-1/4″ Wood Screws
Wood Glue
2x Upholstery Tacks (Pack of 100)

Cut List

3/4″ plywood for base of seat should be cut to 17″ x 22″. I used scrap plywood I had laying around. This doesn’t have to be any particular kind of plywood.

Dimensions

Upholstered X Bench Plans

Step 1: Side Legs

I owned this saw!

Me using the nailer!

Step 2: Assemble Sides

Nailed it!

Times 2!

Step 3: Assemble Top Frame

Screwing the top frame together

Picture perfect!

Step 4: Assemble Base Frame

Top framed screwed on.

Step 5: Add Middle Support

Middle support in place

Step 6: Add Cap to Mid Support

Cap nailed in place

Step 7: Adhere Foam to Plywood

With your plywood cut to 17″ x 22″ spray one side with spray adhesive. Then set the board on the foam and cut the foam to size with a utility knife.

Spray your plywood with spray adhesive

Set board on foam…

… and cut off remaining foam with a utility knife

Step 8: Wrap with Batting

Lay your batting out and once you’ve determined how much you’ll ned to wrap the seat with, cut it to size. Then, staple the batting to the back of the board, as shown, and trim the excess.

Lay out your batting

Cut to size. Leave a little extra. (You can trim later)

Fold over the corners like so.

Pull tight and staple in place

Step 9: Wrap with Fabric

Now, do the same but with your fabric. Be sure to align the pattern (if you have one) as you would like to see it on the top. Also, we found that the corners looked best if we bunched them up as tight as possible and stapled them in place. But you can play around with the corners and see what you like best. To be honest, this was our first upholstered project so we’re no experts at all.

Lay out your fabric. Make sure you pattern on the top side is how you like it!

Staple your sides

Then pull the corners into a tight bunch and staple in place

Step 10: Add Upholstery Nails

Now here comes the painstakingly tedious part. This was so frustrating in the beginning, trying to get them in a straight line and equally spaced. Then, when Jamison heard me almost having a breakdown he came up with the idea of marking them out with a ruler and fine tipped sharpie. We spaced them 1/2″ apart and I like how that turned out. Much easier.

Measure out your nail head spacing

We went with a 1/2″ spacing

Mark your nail head locations and go to town.

Finishing

The base was stained with a Wheat stain from Rust-Oleum and sealed with a satin lacquer spray from Watco

Questions? Comments?

As always, if you have any questions don’t hesitate to comment below and especially don’t forget to post pictures of your finished products in the comments! ENJOY!