Hello all,

I quite fancy making my own desk, largely because any kind of decent wooden (i.e not MDF) are horrendously expensive and won’t fit in the 120cm gap I have available.

Other than kitchen worktops, which don’t seem to be available to buy in small sizes or the limited quantity I need, I’m wondering where to source a length or oak or similar that I can work with.

I’m thinking of using Oak staircase spindles for the legs, something along the lines of: http://www.howdens.com/doors-joinery-collection/stair-parts/spindles/oak-spindle/

I don’t have a great deal of joinery experience so would probably knock something up in MDF to start up with.

Anyone done anything similar? Got pictures if you have?

i have had great success finding off shapes and smaller sizes of nice wood on ebay of all places.

A friend advertised what was left of his oak worktops on ebay as well.

Either that or speak to local kitchen suppliers to see if they have off cuts they would sell.

Ikea often have lengths of oak worktop in their bargain corner. Sometimes damaged ends/corners but far longer than you need so wouldn’t be an issue.

Ikea’s beech stave worktops are very affordable and not as worktop looking as they have a thinner edge – a big fat 50mm edge looks pretty clumpy on a small desk. The come in fairly short lengths as well, maybe not 120cm but near enough that you’re not wasting much if you cut it.

I’ve been looking into this too but for me a standard worktop depth of 600mm isn’t really enough. You can get the stuff meant for kitchen islands which I think is 920mm. Not cheap though.

Get yourself to a sawmill.

Get yourself down to a Howdens warehouse and bung the bloke on the counter a couple of quid for a “damaged” worktop. My hole utility room cost me about £20 and that included 2 carcasses, worktop and sink 🙂 – you may have to arrange this at his/her discretion though.