How to Build an Understorage Bed Frame

Building your own bed frame with storage underneath can get pretty complex if you’re thinking along the lines of drawers and headboards and slats. However, if you pare back the design to basics, you can make a platform bed with under storage cubbies without much hassle at all. What’s more, if you use prefabricated cubby towers as the bed base, building your storage bed becomes much more like a simple assembly job.

2 cubby storage towers, approximately 15 inches tall and deep, and 75 inches long
Wood glue
Ink roller
Sheet 1-inch MDF, 40-by-75 inches
Paint
Paintbrush
Drill
Screws, various lengths

Instructions

- 1
  Apply wood glue to the back of one of your cubby towers, smoothing it over the whole back panel with an ink roller to ensure full contact.
- 2
  Lay both cubbies on their side, back to back, and press them together. Let the glue dry. The two cubbies combined will measure approximately 15 inches high, 30 inches across and 75 inches long for a twin bed base with storage cubby access from either side.
- 3
  Paint a sheet of 1-inch MDF measuring 40-by-75 inches in the same color as your cubbies. This is the platform for the storage bed.
- 4
  Center the platform on top of the cubby bed base. There should be about 5 inches overhang on each side, with the ends more or less flush.
- 5
  Secure the platform to the bed base with screws long enough to go through the platform, and about half the thickness of the cubbies. For example, if the cubbies are made from material about an inch thick, then use 1 1/2-inch screws. Drive screws every 6 to 8 inches around the outer edge of the platform into the cubbies, as well as across the platform on 8-inch centers.

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