Live Wood Edge Coffee Table – Our maple burl coffee table is a unique artistic furniture design by Kelly Maxwell. Handcrafted from air-dried burl wood boards native to the Pacific Northwest. Whether your decorating style is modern, contemporary or rustic, why not add the tranquility of nature to your decor. While buckeye and redwood burl are also options, nothing matches maple burl. Despite the beauty of the table top, no natural wood coffee table is complete without a foundation or base.
That is, the base must complement the burl wood table top. The best choices are wood and metal, roots, logs, antlers and even glass, with the options almost endless. While all are great options, Kelly prefers to use materials salvaged from nature, creating an organic or living furniture design. In the meantime, stay true to live edge wood and its natural form by pairing with a complementary foundation.
Live Wood Edge Coffee Table
But the sky is the limit, or as we say, the only limitation is the imagination. Kelly designs natural rustic furniture using ethically sourced live edge wood and other natural materials found in nature. Adding a twisted juniper log creates an open, airy natural wood coffee table design. But a driftwood or tree stump base is the ultimate foundation for a rustic coffee table. As you know, we recently moved into a new apartment and I’ve been dying to make a new coffee table for the space that can double as a dining area as well (studio living, for the win)! So after picking up a super cool slab at a local lumber dealer, I knew I just had to turn it into a live edge coffee table, ASAP. If you’ve been around for a while, you already know what a sucker I am for real-time projects, especially when they’re teeming with character. This was a project that took me a few weekends to create, but all the TLC was so worth it! Even cooler, it will probably last us a lifetime and a half thanks to my friends at Rust-oleum!
Hairpin Live Edge Table
I have good news and bad news about this project. The good news is that the table turned out AH-mazing. The bad news is that even though I made it our new apartment, my mom loved it so much she stole it.
I absolutely love funky live edge wood slabs… and I absolutely scored when I stumbled across a local lumber dealer (1 Of A Kind Live Edge Plattor) and his collection of wooden cookies. I’ve wanted to create my own version of a funky round table for a long time, and this was the perfect opportunity to do it. Here’s how I made it happen!
1. The first thing I had to do was flatten the plate. This can be done in so many different ways, but for this particular plate I used a combination of a sander and a router with a sled (I used my friend Brandon’s tutorial to make my sled)!
Custom Large Live Edge Coffee Table Round Walnut Burl Big Coffee Table Circular Dark Wood By Kentucky Liveedge
2. I had lots of voids and holes going all the way through my slab that I wanted to preserve. So to do this I taped up the underside of the tile (to prevent the epoxy from seeping through) and then mixed up a small batch of Varathane Super Glaze in Aged Brown.
This rocks! The pigment is already pre-mixed in the resin, so you get an even color every time! It’s also a 1:1 ratio meaning I only had to mix equal parts of the resin and accelerator and just mix them together by hand!
3. After the epoxy cured I did another round of flattening and sanding and I also took some time here to clean up the live edge.
Buy Online Harbor Live Edge Coffee Table Now
4. My slab had a pretty epic crack, so I decided to add some decorative wooden bows to prevent the crack from spreading even further. I used a router and a bow tie template for this and it made such a difference (you can see this in action on the YouTube video)!
5. After mounting the flies I gave the plate a final sanding to 220 grit and then it was time to finish! I mixed up another batch of Varathane Super Glaze in Aged Brown and poured it over the entire tile (the color was
My plate was definitely a little thirsty, so I added a second coat of clear and it dried beautifully!
Live Edge Wood Coffee Table
6. After the slab was done, all that remained was to add some gorgeous table legs (these were designed by my friend Chris at Four Eyes Furniture)!
I am so excited about how this table turned out! I think it looks so cool. The color, the shape, the finish… everything is perfect! When I go “home” for a visit, I literally go home to the same house I grew up in.
Anyone else sleeping in their old bedroom when they go home? Thankfully all my old posters are long gone because there are some things I just don’t want to explain to my kids.
Mahogany Live Edge Coffee Table By Maker House
When I was growing up, one of our home’s “design features” was a 5-foot-long slab of unfinished black walnut wood that sat atop a half-wall. I’m not even sure if the wood panel was attached to that half wall, but it served as one
Dish of sorts. I had the lucky job of dusting off all the nooks and crannies of the slab’s live edge. The teenage eye roll I threw in while doing this was just a bonus.
I never knew until this week that the wooden board has a neat history. It was given to my parents by my uncle Mervin. He worked in the forestry industry, but also competed in logging sports in the 1960s. Yes, lumberjack sports are real. If you’ve never heard of this sport, watch this YouTube video by one of my other relatives, Mel Lentz.
Live Edge Coffee Table
About 12 years ago my dad remodeled the house. The half wall was removed and that gorgeous wooden board that I had spent my entire childhood dusting is moved into storage.
When I came home this last time for a visit, I walked into the living room and was greeted by this beauty: a DIY coffee table from that slab of wood.
That wooden slab was such a feature of my childhood that I never stopped thinking about how it could be used again.
Best Live Edge Coffee Tables For 2022
My stepmom (aka The Junk Whisperer) had a vision of using the wood slab as a coffee table that was absolutely perfect.
The table legs are DIYed from 1.5-inch black metal tubing. This kind of black pipe can be found at any home improvement store, but they came from a plumbing store.
If you buy this type of pipe, you will notice that it is coated with some sort of oily film. If you want to paint it, you need to wash the pipe first to remove that oil. Be sure to prime first or use a spray paint that has primer in it. Otherwise, the paint will not adhere properly.
Live Edge Bench Or Coffee Table With Modern Metal Base
The wood panel had been sanded smooth decades before, but it received a sanding touch up and a few coats of a clear sealer (like this one). I thought the board was cool in its original state, but a few coats of clear sealant really made the wood pop!
Run home RIGHT NOW and search your parents’ garage for treasures that can be reused and recycled.
If you’ve learned nothing else from reading this blog, you should know that my life experiences often serve as a lesson in what not to do.
Olive Wooden Live Edge Coffee Table, France 1960s
Todays lesson? It’s much easier to fit a wooden board into your suitcase BEFORE your parents realize what they have on their hands and turn that beauty into a coffee table. Just saying…
But seriously, it’s so much fun for me to see something old (but not THAT old since I’m still super young) transformed into something new and useful that will bring happiness for years to come.
P.s. I wrote this article on the fly. I didn’t even have my good camera with me. If you have instructional questions about making this DIY live edge coffee table, let me know and I can dive into it in the comments section or in a separate article.
Amazon.com: Alpine Live Edge Solid Wood 48
By Kevin Eyres. I highly recommend actually going to Ireland to buy this book, but if that seems like an excursion, you can also buy it on Amazon.
Thanks for hanging out with me today at my parents’ house! It has been fun! If you want to read some other stories from my visits home, here you go.is no longer supports older versions of your browser to ensure user data remains secure. Update to the latest version.
17″H x 36/42/48/60″ Length. *Width will vary depending on the individual plate but ranges between 16-23 approximately for standard width and 24-32 for X-Wide.
Live Edge Rustic Wood Coffee Table Farmhouse Table Mid
Depending on species, available stock and width/depth, your table can be made from anywhere from one to three slabs joined together to achieve the desired width/depth.
Side table set is 20″