New Entryway Bench & Hanging Storage

We bought a hall tree about 3 years ago for $50. It was an old, handmade one, and had character. Some mismatched boards in the back, a little rough around the edges, etc. But it looked pretty good, and it suited our needs. We could throw all our shoes in and close the lid, and use it to hang up some coats and backpacks. It even mostly matched our existing woodwork.

Our old hall tree

But as we've made changes to the house, I felt it was time for something new, and decided to make a new bench. I looked around online for plans, and finally found a video tutorial with a bench I felt matched what we were looking for. I had to modify some of the dimensions to fit our space, but I mostly followed what he laid out.

This is made mostly of plywood, with slots routed on the sides and in the middle for the dividers

Here's the bench with trim attached

I painted the entire lower part of the bench white

I stained the top of the bench with a walnut color - I love the grain patterns of this wood

Completed bench, sans drawers

We found some fabric drawers at Walmart to hold shoes

But we also wanted something to hang up some bags and store winter gear / school stuff like folders and lunchboxes. So after looking at a lot of designs online and not finding what I wanted, I decided to design something new myself. I learned how to use the online version of a 3D modeling program called Sketchup, and created this.

I made several iterations of this design before deciding on one

Finalized Design 

Finalized design (other angle)

Then I got into the actual build. For the majority of the unit I used plywood, adding edge-banding for the exposed edges, and painted it white. For both the top and front, I used some solid pine with cool grain patterns, stained that same walnut color as the bench (with a polyurethane top coat).

Once everything was cut and sanded, I glued and clamped everything in place, then brad-nailed it together. For the bottom piece that hangs down, I used pocket-hole screws at the back.

 

Because I painted and stained/finished the pieces separately, I wasn't sure how I should attach the stained pieces to the rest of the unit (wood glue doesn't work great on finished surfaces, and I needed it to hold up to children). I finally decided to use my stepped drill bit I use for pocket holes to get slightly bigger holes than needed, attach the faces with screws, then fill the holes with a dowel and restain/refinish.

 

Here I have the holes drilled and screws holding the piece in place. I put some wood glue in the hole and pounded in a dowel (with a rubber mallet).

 

  
Once I had the dowel firmly in place, I (carefully) used my flush cut pull saw to cut off the excess. I also used a chisel to get the last little bit, and sanded down flush with the surface. Later, I came back and re-stained the area, then gave the whole thing a couple coats of polyurethane. I think it all came out looking pretty good.

The finished product hanging on the wall

Both bench and cubby together