Making the nightstand top

Stuff always seems to fall off of nightstands, so I wanted to add some raised edges around the top of this nightstand. But I also wanted to round the corners because of kids bumping into them. This presented a challenge. I settled for 45 degree corners to make it easier instead to make it easier.

I started by cutting a 45° corner off the two front corners.


I then glued very short pieces of trim to the corners.


Then trimmed these flush with the long edges of the top.


After that I glued on the trim on the long edges.


And then trimmed the long edges flush with the very short piece in the corner.

My initial idea had been to glue the long edges on first, then cut the corner off and glue the 45 degree piece on and trim it flush with the long edges, but that would not have looked as good and with the short trim piece outside on the corner, would have made it more likely to break off.


I then rounded the outside corners on my belt sander.


I also rounded the top and bottom of the long edges by tilting the table top against the running belt sander.


I used a small hand plane to put a bevel on the inside edges, Then rounded them with sand paper. I also rounded the corner edges by hand with sandpaper.


Finally checking how it looks on the table.


Back to nightstand build