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    Home » Woodworking » DIY Furniture Plans » DIY Storage Cabinet Plans

    DIY Console Table with Drawers

    January 22, 2021 by Shara, Woodshop Diaries

    In this post, I’m sharing how to build a DIY console table with drawers using basic 2x4s and plywood!

    Finished DIY console table with drawers staged with plant and books on middle shelf

    This DIY console table is actually one part of a five piece matching office furniture set that I built for my dad’s office.

    He needed somewhere to store and display some of his product samples for his customers.

    But if you didn’t need it for a storefront (because it’s probably rare that you would haha), it would also work great as an entryway table or a console table in a dining room, living room, or home office.

    The design is somewhat unique with the two deep drawers at the bottom–great for storing books, dishes, toys, even shoes.

    It’s almost like a dresser combined with a bookshelf which makes this build great for both storage and display.

    If you want to build one of your own, I’m sharing the video tutorial and the DIY console table building plans below!

    Tools & Materials

    *This post contains affiliate links. See policies.

    Tools:

    • Circular saw
    • Miter Saw
    • Drill
    • Pocket hole jig
    • Table saw (optional)

    Materials:

    • (3) 2x4x8 boards
    • (4) 2x2x8 boards (or just add two more 2x4s and make your own 2x2s from that)
    • (1) sheet ¾″ plywood (I used birch)
    • ½ sheet ¼″ plywood
    • (3) 8 ft sticks cove molding (optional)
    • (2) pair 16″ ball bearing drawer slides
    • 2 ½″ pocket hole screws
    • 1 ¼″ pocket hole screws
    • 2″ wood screws
    • Wood Glue
    • Edge Banding

    What to Know Before Building

    I kept this build easy and inexpensive by using birch plywood and basic 2x4s from The Home Depot. 

    But, obviously, you can use any wood type you wish for this project if you’re building it yourself.

    Matching Office Furniture Pieces

    This is one part of a five part series of matching office furniture that I built for my dad.

    You can check out the whole matching series of pieces here.

    collage of 5 matching home office furniture pieces
    Matching Office Furniture Series

    Building the Leg Posts

    As part of this matching series, you’ll notice from the image above that I used large 3″ square posts for the legs of each piece.

    I made these by gluing up 2x4s and trimming the edges down on the table saw.

    You may already know this, but 2x4s are actually 1 ½″ x 3 ½″ (not 2″ x 4″) and they typically come with rounded corners.

    So if you glue two of them together, you’ll have a post that is about 3″ x 3 ½″ but where the rounded corners meet, it won’t look all that great.

    rounded board corners butted together

    To clean those edges, I’ll run them through the table saw to remove about ¼″ on each side.

    Then I’ll have nice, square 3″ posts.

    Squaring table leg on table saw

    However, if you don’t have a table saw, this isn’t absolutely necessary. You can definitely leave them as is.

    Just note that your legs will be 3″ x 3 ½″, so you may have to make some minor adjustments to the measurements in the plans to accommodate.

    Overall Dimensions

    The overall dimensions of this two drawer console table is 19″ deep x 30 ¾″ tall x 48″ wide.

    Overall dimensions of DIY console table with storage drawers--48" wide, 19" deep, 30 ¾" tall

    Helpful Resources While Building

    You may find these guides and articles helpful throughout the building process:

    • How to cut down plywood sheets
    • How to cut your own 2x2s
    • How to use a pocket hole jig
    • How to apply edge banding
    • How to build and install drawers

    How to Build a DIY Console Table with Drawers

    This is a great weekend project and is an intermediate level build. It uses basic joinery methods to keep assembly quick and simple.

    If you prefer to watch, check out the video tutorial below.

    I’m sharing the building plans for free in the post below, but if you prefer to print your plans, you can grab the printable building plans here.

    Step 1: Assemble Console Table Legs

    I started this project out by gluing up 2x4s to make the leg posts.  See notes in the “what to know before building” section above.

    To glue up the legs, I trimmed down my 2x4s to roughly 32” long pieces and glued and clamped four sets of 2 together to make four leg posts.

    Shara clamping two 2x4s together to make leg posts

    Once the glue dried, I took them to the table saw to clean up the edges and trim them down to a square 3” x 3” post. 

    Since 2x4s are about 1 ½” thick and 3 ½” wide, I had to remove about ½” from the width to match the thickness of 3”.

    NOTE: if you don’t have a table saw, you can simply sand the edges clean and leave the posts as 3′ x 3 ½″. Just note that if you leave the width 3 ½″, make sure to assemble the frame with the legs oriented so the wider side is on the WIDTH of the piece and not the depth.

    Once the posts were 3” square, I took them to the miter saw to trim them to 30” long.

    I tapered the ends of these leg posts for some extra detail.  This is a totally optional step, but to do this, I adjusted my miter saw angle to 60 degrees and cut two adjacent sides from the center at the bottom out to the edge.

    Diagram of tapered leg posts for DIY console table with drawers

    Once the legs were trimmed and tapered, I could move on to the fun stuff—assembly.

    Step 2: Assemble Console Table Side Panels

    The main frame of this project was built with 2x2s.  You can purchase precut 2x2s at the lumber yard, but I like to cut my own from 2x4s.

    RELATED: How to cut your own 2x2s

    Either way, I just cut six pieces of 2×2 to 12″ long to build two identical side frames like shown below.

    I assembled the pieces using 1 ½″ pocket holes and 2 ½″ pocket hole screws.

    RELATED: How to use a pocket hole jig to drill pocket holes

    Notice that the 2x2s are attached so they are flush across the INSIDE of the legs and the tapers face the inside corners.

    Side panel frame assembled with 2x2 between the leg posts

    I used wood glue at each pocket hole joint.  I find that using 2 pocket holes in a 2×2 will usually cause the wood to split, so I like to use wood glue with just one pocket hole screw with my 2x2s. 

    However, feel free to use 2 if you’d rather.

    Since the bottom of this piece has drawers, I wanted to install a solid panel at the bottom of both side frames so I could mount the slides to it. 

    I cut two pieces of ¾″ plywood for this and installed then into the side frames using ¾″ pocket holes and 1 ¼″ pocket hole screws.

    RELATED: How to cut plywood sheets

    DIY console table side panel with 3x3 posts, 2x2 frame, and plywood panel installed at bottom

    Notice that this panel is attached so it’s flush across the INSIDE of the legs and frame.

    Step 3: Assemble Middle Shelf Panel

    Once the two side panels were assembled, I was ready to build the rest of the frame, but first, I decided to attach the middle plywood panel between the two middle supports.

    I cut a piece of ¾″ plywood to use as the middle shelf panel (cut to 15″ x 40″) and drilled ¾″ pocket holes around the edges.

    Then, I cut six 2x2s to 40″ to use as the front and back frame pieces and drilled 1 ½″ pocket holes into the ends of each.

    To make things easier, I “preassembled” this middle shelf by screwing the panel into two of the 2x2s like shown below using ¾″ pocket holes and 1 ¼″ pocket hole screws. 

    Middle Shelf subassembly diagram

    I attached the shelf so that it was flush across the top of the 2x2s and used a clamp to help hold the pieces together while I drove the screws.

    Step 4: Assemble Console Table Frame

    I secured the middle shelf between the side panels so that the top of the shelf was even with the top of the middle 2×2 pieces.

    Then, I installed the other 2x2s in with wood glue and 2 ½″ pocket hole screws—two at the top and two at the bottom.

    Keep in mind that for the 2x2s, you will use 1 ½″ pocket holes with 2 ½″ pocket hole screws and with the ¾″ plywood, you will use ¾″ pocket holes with 1 ¼″ pocket hole screws.

    Diagram showing how to assemble DIY console table frame--2x2s in pink and ¾" plywood shelf in green

    Then, I added some 2×2 pieces in the middle at the bottom to separate the two drawers. 

    Since these pieces were small, I couldn’t get in to drive a pocket hole screw at the bottom, so I just did one at the top and used a 2 ½″ wood screw to attach these divider pieces at the bottom.

    Diagram showing middle dividers installed on bottom of DIY console frame

    Then, I screwed another 2×2 between them to give me somewhere to mount the drawer slides.

    Graphic showing the middle divider drawer slide support on bottom of shelf frame in purple

    Step 5: Attach Top to DIY Console with Drawers

    I cut a piece of ¾″ plywood for the top to 19″ x 48″. 

    I applied iron on edge banding to the sides of the top to clean up the edges a little before and gave it a good sanding before attaching.

    RELATED: How to apply iron on edge banding

    Then, I installed it onto the base using 2″ wood screws through the top 2x2s. I left 1” overhang on the front and on each side.

    Diagram showing dimensions of top plywood piece and how to attach through top supports of shelf

    NOTE: If you left your legs 3 ½″ wide in step 1, you will leave only ½″ overhang on the sides…not 1″. Or you can cut your top 49″ long and leave the full 1″.

    Step 6: Build and Install Drawers

    I installed two pair of 16” ball bearing drawer slides into the shelf so that they were 1 ½” inset from the front edge.

    RELATED: How to install drawer slides

    After the slides were installed, I cut ¾″ plywood pieces for the drawer boxes and some ¼″ plywood pieces for the drawer bottoms like shown here.

    Exploded view of different pieces and cuts to build drawer boxes for console table

    I cut the pieces needed to make two identical drawers.

    I cut ¼″ dadoes ¼″ deep ½″ from the bottom edge of the drawer box sides to install the ¼″ plywood drawer bottom.

    However, you don’t have to cut dadoes if you don’t want. You can simply glue and staple or screw the plywood bottom in place.

    RELATED: How to Build Drawer Boxes

    I edge banded the drawer box tops—which is an optional step, but looks really nice so I think it’s worth doing.

    RELATED: 5 Secrets to Professional Looking DIY Furniture

    Then I assembled the drawer boxes using ¾″ pocket holes and 1 ¼″ pocket hole screws.

    Overall dimensions of drawer box assembled

    Then, I installed the drawer boxes into the shelf so that the bottom of the boxes were about ¼″ up from the 2×2 frame piece below it.

    RELATED: How to install drawer boxes

    Shara Woodshop Diaries installing drawer boxes into DIY console table frame

    Step 7: Build and Install Drawer Fronts to Shelf Drawers

    To dress up the drawer fronts a little, I added some cove molding trim to the front edges.

    First, I cut the the ¾″ plywood drawer fronts to size (9 ¾″ x 19″ shown in blue below).

    Then, I cut to fit cove molding to frame out the front edges.

    Close of of drawer front and dimensions with cove molding attached around edges

    I just used a little wood glue on the molding and painters tape to hold the pieces in place until it dried. Once the glue dried, I removed the tape.

    Then, I installed the drawer fronts onto the drawer boxes using 1 ¼″ wood screws from the inside of the drawer boxes leaving ⅛″ gap around all sides.

    Diagram of DIY console table with one drawer open showing how to install drawer front from inside

    Step 8: Add Trim on Sides (OPTIONAL) & Finish

    I also added some cove molding around the side panels—I just glued these to avoid the nail holes, but you could also brad nail these pieces if you wanted.

    Diagram showing cove molding installed onto side panels of shelf project--highlighted molding in green

    To seal and finish this DIY console table, I simply gave it a couple coats of Minwax Helmsman Water Based Poly to keep its natural color, then added some simple black handles to the drawers.

    Console table shelf with drawers staged for photos with drawers open to show storage inside

    And now it’s ready to be put to good use. 

    I’m loving the option for both storage and display with this DIY console table with drawers. It’s going to be perfect for my Dad’s office.

    If you’re interested in all the matching pieces from his office builds check them out here.

    Front view of DIY console shelf with drawers closed--finished in a clear coat poly

    Looking for more Console Storage Table Ideas?

    If you’re looking for more project ideas and inspiration, here are a few other storage and console style tables you will love!

    Stenciled Door Console
    Sliding Door Console
    DIY Modern Console Cabinet
    How to build a DIY X base console table with middle shelf for added storage--free building plans!
    DIY X Base Console

    So if you’ve enjoyed the past projects (and this one too!), be sure to subscribe to my newsletter below so you don’t miss the upcoming posts!

    And if you’d like to save this for later, don’t forget to pin it or share to your favorite social media channel!

    Pinterest Graphic showing the overall dimensional diagram of the console table and a finished shot of the shelf staged with drawers closed and text "how to build a DIY shelf with storage drawers"

    Until next time, friends, happy building 😊

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