Category: DIY Furniture

Nicole gave new life to her family heirloom. This wet bar is sturdy and stylish with a new set of hairpin legs…all while keeping with the style of the piece. Nicole already had this beautiful wet bar in her family:

My mother’s godfather, Sam Marino started Bay Stage Lighting in 1957 in Tampa, FL. When my parents bought the business in 1998 the bar was in Sam’s office and it lived there for many more years until we moved the business to a different location. At that time the bar went into storage. It fell back into my hands a couple years ago.

Keeping quality furniture in the family gives it such character and keeps stories from the past alive. Well cared for wood can last for centuries. Hardware such as legs are not always as lucky. Nicole’s wet bar was not being supported the way it should be so she set out for a solution that honored the whole piece:

It lived in my family room for a few years on some really ugly castors that had worn out their welcome… every time it was moved or leaned on, a castor would slip out making the bar uneven and all contents would slide around… I wrote on a mid-century modern Facebook page that I belong to asking what would be appropriate and the moderator quickly responded “hairpin”.

Upgrading furniture while honoring its style makes for great results! If you’re not in the position to revive a family heirloom, start the tradition now with a great piece of furniture.

We’re glad our hairpin legs made this beautiful piece of furniture live on! It sounds like Nicole is pleased as well:

The bar has a new lease on life now, and is looking better than ever.

Making your own hairpin leg furniture is fun and rewarding. There are so many options when you start to consider tabletop styles, hairpin leg types, and finishing touches. Robert shared these slab tables with us and they are so fun! These three tables could be used in conjunction with each other, in different places in the same room, or in multiple rooms around the house.

Though they are quite similar, these three hairpin leg tables really point out a lot of options you can go with when choosing what you want for your own hairpin leg project. First you get to choose the number of hairpin legs to use. While many pieces are best supported with four hairpin legs, sometimes three legs are perfect! And for six hairpin legs Robert has three tables!

Finish and color are other options you may want to consider for your upcoming DIY project. Our hairpin legs are all made of solid steel rod. That means they are durable! They can certainly take any wear and tear you throw at them even when left untreated. Many of our customers like the raw unfinished look of the steel itself. But you are certainly not limited to that. Keeping the metal legs in their original steel appearance or some other darker color creates the look of the legs blending into their surroundings. This is a nice touch especially when you want the tabletop itself highlighted; the legs play more of a supporting role (pun intended). Brighter and bolder colors will draw more attention the hairpin legs themselves.

In the middle table here, Robert added color to the legs as well as to the tabletop itself. This brings us to another option featured in these tables: tabletop color. Many a hairpin leg table have been made from simple wood tabletops. But adding color is always an option. That can be through painting the top, painting a portion of the top, using different materials than just wood alone, or by using space in the wood to add color. Making hairpin leg tables is always fun! These are just a few options you get when you make your own furniture. Thank you for sharing Robert, excellent job!

We were amazed at the green hues in this amazing wood. Robert made this console table from a living edge slab of rare wood. Any guesses what it is? Many of us have eaten the nuts from this tree but not many have seen the wood in person. It’s pistachio! That makes the green coloring a little more explainable, but not all pistachio wood is this colored. This is a truly amazing specimen.

Live edge wood is always unique but even more so in this case. Not many folks have seen pistachio wood or even a pistachio tree so keeping the live edges really tells the story of this wood. It is fun to picture the size of the tree it must have come from. The dark coloring of remaining bark perfectly blends into the Twist hairpin legs. Choosing the style of hairpin legs can really change the overall image of the table. The taller height required of console tables necessitates a tall set of hairpin legs. This additional height allows for the metal legs to really show what they’re made of and be an artistic part of the furniture. We think the dark set of Twist hairpin legs is perfect on this table. We’re glad Robert is happy with them too:

Your outstanding legs compliment an equally outstanding piece of pistachio. Thank you so much for your creative and solid craftsmanship and outstanding service.

Thanks for sharing, Robert. We’re glad you had the opportunity to work with this amazing live edge slab wood. Excellent finished product!

In part one of our feature on Todd’s live edge furniture, we talked about styles of hairpin table legs. Today we wanted to share how Todd used hairpin legs and metal bench legs to make a matching (but not identical) set of DIY furniture.

Though there are many similarities between the pieces its striking how different the two pieces look simply by choosing different metal leg styles. Both hairpin legs and the bench legs are beautiful, functional, and durable. But they have totally different looks. The solid construction of the flat bar bench legs imparts a solid and sturdy look to the bench as a whole. The hairpin legs are just as durable as the bench legs, but we find that their thin construction doesn’t draw the eye to the legs much, meaning the tabletop is the star of the piece. What a perfect use on a small bench by the front door. The natural shape of the live edge slab looks perfect against the stone siding on this house. All in all, an excellent addition to this home!

The choice of where to place furniture in the house can be a fun one! Some folks like similar hairpin leg furniture all in the same room. For example, we’ve seen matching end tables and a coffee table all in the living room. Hairpin leg furniture throughout the house is another great option. The metal leg furniture right outside the home will look great with the second piece inside the house. What a great way to distribute the natural look of wood throughout the house.

Thanks for sharing Todd!

Todd made these amazing console tables, and although it probably wasn’t his intention, it’s a great example of how different hairpin table legs can change the look of a table. Both tables are made with live edge slab wood and hairpin table legs. The two hairpin leg styles Todd chose are the twist hairpin legs and the “Just the Tip” hairpin legs. Each style is a modern furniture leg made of solid steel rod, but the way these rods are shaped gives each it’s completely different look.

We’re often asked what differences there are between hairpin leg styles. Most obvious is the appearance. Different styles work best for different tabletops, areas of the house, and most importantly, preference. Preference is usually the deciding factor in your finished product. A few styles of metal legs offer additional weight support if that is a deciding factor in your project. Bench legs, 3 rod hairpin legs, and Just the Tip hairpin legs offer the most weight support. The Just the Tip hairpin legs seems more stable in appearance and hints at the claw foot style some of us grew up with. Though the twist hairpin leg can hold up a fair amount of weight itself, it gives a lighter more playful look to the table.

Think about what you want your final product to look like and that will help give you an idea as to what the best style of hairpin table legs will be for your project. Now you have some side-by-side images illustrate their differences. For some folks it is helpful to get an idea of how the final project will look before deciding on a hairpin leg style. When you’re finished, send us a picture of what you came up with, we’d love to see!