I wanted a craft and drawing table for my two kids. The table would also store all of their materials.
Besides that, I needed a table that can be accessed from both sides as I have two kids. I didn’t want a big table that would use up a lot of space in the living room either. Here’s what I came up with.
IKEA TROFAST Kid’s Craft Table Hack
Materials:
- TROFAST Frame
- VIKA AMON table top (L: 40 1/8″)
- 2 GRUNDTAL rails
- 2 MALA paper rolls
Steps to hack a kids craft table:
1. I wanted to use the smaller VIKA AMON to save on space. However, the 22″ high TROFAST frames came in only single or triple sections. So to make it fit under the table top, I cut the excess wood, beyond the second section off. I used a handsaw, but an electric saw would have made things so much easier and faster.
3. Cut the bottom panels as well.
4. Then, I assembled the remaining two sections like a regular TROFAST. (If you have space, all these steps to shorten the TROFAST are not necessary. Just get a longer table top!)
5. Install the GRUNDTAL rails on VIKA AMON. In order to fit them and still be able to unscrew the pipe to put on a roll, you have to cut the pipes about 1.5″ both. Before cutting the pipes, hammer the part where you put the screw in inside the pipe, a little bit more than 1.5″ back.
6. Fasten TROFAST onto VIKA AMON with screws. We used 10 wood screws.
7. Put the MALA paper rolls on.
8. Put the drawer rails in and insert the drawers.
We actually screwed the tabletop on before installing the GRUNDTAL rails. Later we had to move the tabletop a little bit to the side so that the rail holders would fit on the other side.
The table is very stable. It is a little bit higher that an average children’s craft table since total height is 22″+1 5/8″.
Final Steps:
1. Introduce the new craft table to the kids
2. Make sure they learn to put away their papers, materials, and scraps into the drawer bins.
Option 1: You can make a bigger table with a larger VIKA AMON table top (L: 48 3/8′) on top of a complete TROFAST frame.
Option 2: You can put LEGO base plates on the table and use the table as a LEGO workstation as well. I am thinking about adding this feature by gluing LEGO baseplates on a thin plywood I got from IKEA as-is dept and fixing it to the table top with hinges, but I think it will be too much. Maybe I’ll just make it and keep it separate/portable.
See more of the children’s craft table.
~ by Pratik Anne, Chicago, IL, USA