Improvised Bedside Table: A Before-And-After

I've had fabric-covered boxes as my bedside table for over three years now. It started off as a short-term solution until I found a bedside table I liked better than my boxes. Three years in, however, I still haven't managed to buy a table for beside my bed. I often forget to look for something I could repaint or repurpose, and after all, my boxes are doing just fine--if it ain't broke, don't fix it!

Old fabrics, new fabrics, and bedspread

The boxes had gotten to where they could use a bit of fixing, however. Three years of having damp glasses of water sitting on them, my cat jumping on them, and my vacuum cleaner running into them had made the boxes a bit softer, and the fabric a bit dirtier, than they first were. I laundered and ironed my fabrics, then stopped. My original plan for my bedroom color scheme was pastel pink and blue. As I decorated, however, I found very little pink-and-blue, and lots of pink-and-green. My original table fabrics didn't really match the bedroom, or my bedspread, as well as they could have. I decided to try some other fabrics. I love the pink-with-blue-roses vintage print, but the newer pink and green roses really do look better with my bedspread.



I had a few boxes I had saved from some shipments I received at work, so I tried stacking them in different ways. This is the arrangement I went with. If I'd had larger pieces of fabric to work with, I could have covered two same-size boxes with a single fabric, but most of my fabric is scraps from dressmaking, so I don't have pieces that large! The shape of this "table" reminds me of some 1950s vintage wooden end tables my parents have in their living room. I've always liked those tables.










Here are the fabric-covered boxes. I covered the top one tightly with the printed fabric, then decided to drape the fabric over the lower one a bit more loosely, sort of like a tablecloth, only tucked underneath at the edges. I used plain straight pins to secure the printed fabric to the smaller box. They stay pretty well in the thick corrugated cardboard of the box.

Here's the final product! I added a small metal tray to the top to help support the weight of my lamp and such, and to help protect the cardboard from future damp water glasses!