A Simple Hack Makes the IKEA ANTILOP High Chair Twice as Useful

A Dutch camper modified her IKEA ANTILOP high chair with shortened legs, creating two seating heights from one chair.

The ANTILOP high chair is basically a small kid’s camping essential. We’d bring ours everywhere: picnic tables, camper benches, garden patios.

It’s weather-proof, you can hose it down, and it takes up almost no space in your van.

But here’s the thing—sometimes you don’t need a high chair. Sometimes you need a low chair that tucks under your camping table. Or one that sits at ground level for outdoor meals. Or that perfect height for booth seating inside your camper.

That’s when we realized: what if we just… made the legs shorter?

IKEA ANTILOP low chair hack

IKEA items used:

• ANTILOP high chair ($24.99)
• ANTILOP high chair legs. (4 in a pack / $6.99)

Tools:

• Saw
• Drill

The IKEA hack is simple. You’re not rebuilding anything. You’re just creating an alternative set of legs that give you a second chair in one.

Step-by-Step Process for an ANTILOP low-chair

1. Determine the desired leg length.

Decide how high you want the seat to be. Before you cut anything, think about how you’ll actually use this. Will it sit under your camping table? Next to a dining bench? Directly on the ground?

Measure the height you want. Consider the resulting footprint of the legs, fitting your bench. Shorter legs mean a more compact base, which is perfect for fitting under tables or into tight corners of your camper.

2. Cut the legs to length.

Cut off the top part, measuring from the feet upward, and mark your line. Using a saw, cut off the top portion of each leg. The plastic foot stays at the bottom; you’re removing length from the top where the seat attachment happens.

3. Remove the spring clips from the cut-off leg pieces.

The ANTILOP legs are held in place with small spring clips, flat pieces of bent steel that snap into a hole in the leg to lock it into the seat base. With a bit of fiddling, the clips are easy to remove.

4. Drill new holes in the shortened legs.

You need to drill new holes in your shortened legs at the same distance from the top as the original legs had them.

Here’s the crucial bit: look at the shortened ANTILOP leg. The plastic foot has a flat face that sits parallel to the floor. The hole needs to go on the opposite side of that flat face.

Before you drill:

• Test-fit your shortened leg into the seat base
• Rotate it until it sits right
• Mark where the hole should go
• Then drill

5. Install the spring clips

Insert the spring clips into your new holes. They should snap in with a satisfying little click, just like they do on the original legs. If they don’t fit, double-check your hole placement.

6. Take a seat

Done! Now you have an even more versatile IKEA chair, perfect for camping, outdoor meals next to the camper, or indoor booth seating.

The best part? You now basically have two chairs in one; a high chair and a low chair, while all you need to pack is this small extra set of shortened legs.

Happy camping!

~ by Pauline (Utrecht, The Netherlands)

---

Ideas to customize the IKEA ANTILOP high chair

---

NEXT: See more IKEA ANTILOP high chair hacks