Nothing pulls a room together quite like a stand-out piece of furniture.
Whether it's that rustic farm table that turns an ordinary kitchen into the cooking paradise of your dreams, or this dramatic all-natural centerpiece of a terrarium, the perfect piece can complete a room like nothing else.
Of course, tracking down that ideal furnishing is easier said than done. You can peruse antique stores all you like, but sometimes you just can't find what you need.
And when that happens, and you're left with no other options? Well, then it's time to put on your DIY hat and just make it yourself!
That's exactly what the creative engineer and amateur carpenter Michael Heyns did, in pursuit of a table of his very own, modeled after the work of Greg Klassen, who creates furniture inspired by the natural look of the raw materials.
In that spirit, he made his own beautiful coffee table, with nothing but a few pieces of wood, metal, and glass!
First, Heyns started with a piece of local wood, cut in the "live edge" style.
The live edge look essentially means that the piece of wood is left with its natural edge intact.
Rather than cutting to a standard planed rectangle, all knots, ripples, and bends in the wood are preserved.
He divided his live edge slab on a diagonal, into two sections.
Those two pieces were lined up in such a way that the outer, live edges ran roughly parallel to one another, while the interior of the slab became the regularly rectangular exterior edges and corners of the table.
From there, his next step was to join the pieces of the slab harmoniously into a single tabletop.
For that purpose, Heyns decided to use cut glass to fill the gap between the wooden pieces.
He selected a slab of glass for the job and cut it to fit the shape of the wood, creating a curving "river" shape.
Meanwhile, he also planed the wood and prepared it for the glass insert.
With lots of careful measurements of both the glass pieces and the wooden slabs, he was able to create a nearly seamless transition between the rustic surface of the wooden slabs and the smooth, sleek glass.
With a careful eye to the specifications of the project, the surface of the table isn't interrupted by the glass join.
Of course, a tabletop does not a table make.
In order to truly make his project into a functional piece of furniture, the next step was adding an array of simple hairpin legs.
Heyns welded these simple, minimal-looking legs himself, but there are lots of options available online that create the same effect, like the Floyd Utility Set.
Once the table is fully sanded and finished, the legs are drilled into the bottom of the tabletop, and, voilà, a perfectly minimalist coffee table that makes a nod to Mother Nature!
The table is a simple, sturdy piece of furniture, full of understated elegance, thanks to the unique touch of the live edge wood and the glass join — perfect for entertaining!
If you're already totally obsessed with this rustic minimalist piece, make sure to SHARE Heyns' tutorial online for everyone who lives for stunning interior design!
