Mid-Century Modern Dinette Table

What do you do when you can’t find the right dinette table for your breakfast nook? You build one!

I spent weeks shopping for a table but everything I found was either the wrong style, size or color; or it was cheaply made; or it was super-expensive. While I was shopping, I started to get a vision for exactly what I wanted. I was looking for something retro but wth a modern twist. So I decided the best way to get exactly what I wanted was to build it myself.

I started with a piece of 13-ply, furniture-grade plywood (also called Baltic Birch) .75 inches thick. I chose this wood because I wanted to expose the edges. I cut down the board into two pieces slightly over my finished size, then glued and clamped them together to double the thickness to 1.5 inches. Next I trimmed the top to the finished size (30x42 inches), using a plywood blade to get a fairly smooth edge. I toyed with the idea of radiused corners but decided a bevel was easier. After it was cut to size, I used my router with a chamfer bit to create a relief under the table, making the top look thinner from above and it giving it a smoother edge. I filled any voids in the plywood with wood filler and sanded them smooth. I also sanded all the beveled corners to round them off slightly.

Then came the fun part, I ordered a piece of vintage-style laminate. It’s Formica brand and the color is Aqua Boomerang. Unfortunately, this color has been discontinued by Formica but it was still in stock at the Lowes warehouse. I used contact cement to mount the laminate, taking care to leave a little extra laminate around the edge. I retracted the chamfer bit on my router to about .25 inches and trimmed off the edge to create a slight relief on top. I masked off the laminate and applied three coats of polyurthane to the exposed plywood edge, sanding in-between coats. Last, I mounted the top to a sturdy restaurant table base using lag screws. I orded a new base but if you look around, you can find used bases from a restaurant supply. Mine has a powder coated flat bottom (I don’t like the ones with legs) and a retro chrome stem.

I bought a couple of chairs from Ikea and the set is complete. I think it came out really well and it cost me well below $200 (not including chairs or tools). Plus, this table is solid as a rock, it could easily stand up to commercial restaurant use and abuse.

Here’s a photo of the finished set.