When Matthew was close to transitioning to a regular bed, we wanted to create something with storage. We liked a style of bed with drawers on both sides and on the end. I had really wanted a chance to do something with drawers on a big scale, and this bed was an opportunity. The idea was to create the base for the bed in three sections, left, right and end, to make it easier to disassemble if ever needed. With previous success working and finishing mahogany, decided to use this wood for the frame of the bed.
Also important was creating a bed with durable full extension drawer slides, and found some good, affordable, heavy duty slides by Shop Fox. The drawer shells are made with pocket holes, not dovetails, but the joint is very strong and it has stood the test of abuse by kids and parents alike. Not using dovetail joinery is a typical compromise I make, choosing to concentrate on limiting how many new skills per project. In this case, I wanted to perfect making inset drawer fronts.
I used rail and style router bits with a plywood insert to make the drawer fronts, and I aligned the drawer fronts using a high tech tool–ok, just coins–but the coins did help space out the drawer fronts evenly and allowed me to get the alignment set. This bed was good opportunity to build drawers, and the result is a set of useful larger drawers under the bed that are sturdy enough to hold just about anything, whether it is toys, books, cloths, or whatever else kids can dream up.
Jeff Staley 