Do you tend to pile bedside storage on the floor next to your bed?
Stuff on the floor looks cluttered and makes vacuuming harder.
So I built a wall-mounted bedside shelf instead.
This article shows how to build it — written for anyone who wants a small wall-mounted shelf next to their bed.
Finished Look and Dimensions
What does a “wall-mounted bedside shelf” look like?
Here’s the finished version first.
Finished
It’s basically a small shelf bolted to the wall.
It puts a book or phone within easy reach from the bed.
Mounting it on the wall also makes vacuuming a lot easier.
Dimensions
The shelf I built measures:
Width: 250 mm (about 9.8″)
Height: 400 mm (about 15.7″)
Depth: 218 mm (about 8.6″)
Like this:
Build Steps
Here’s the build flow:
(More precisely, there’s a sanding step after cutting the wood. Details below.)
Tools and Materials
Tools
For this build I used:
- Cordless drill/driver
- Circular saw (for cutting wood — a hand saw also works)
- Sandpaper (#240 and #400)
- Wood screws (38 mm long — about 2× the board thickness)
I used a circular saw for cuts, but a jigsaw or hand saw works fine.
You can also have the home improvement store cut the wood to size for you.
Sandpaper: #240 to clean up the cut edges, #400 to smooth the surfaces.
For wood screws, a length of about 2× the board thickness is the typical rule.
I used 18 mm boards, so 38 mm screws.
Materials
I used 18 mm pine glue-laminated panel from the home improvement store.
This was leftover from a desk I built recently.
Pick whatever wood you like — pine has a nice bright look and I use it often.
(I have an article on the desk build that this leftover came from — Japanese version, English translation forthcoming.)
The shelf is made up of these 6 boards:
Cut dimensions are below.
These are my numbers — adjust freely to fit your space.
Building the Shelf
Starting with the shelf itself.
Cutting and sanding
Cut to dimensions with a circular saw.
A hand saw or jigsaw works just as well.
You can also decide your dimensions ahead of time and have the home improvement store cut everything for you.
All cut.
Sand each piece. #240 for the cut edges, #400 for the surfaces.
Assembly
Screw the boards together with wood screws.
I used 38 mm screws.
Aim for screw length about 2× the board thickness.
Boards are 18 mm here, so 18 × 2 = 36 mm or so. (I don’t always follow this rule strictly, but…)
Drill pilot holes before driving screws.
This prevents the wood from splitting. Use a bit slightly smaller than the screw shank.
(Some people deliberately drill larger than the screw — different schools of thought on this.)
Drive the screws with the cordless driver. (You can also do this by hand if you prefer.)
Repeat for all the joints.
Shelf is assembled.
Beeswax finish
I want to keep the natural wood look this time, so no stain — just a beeswax finish.
Beeswax is commonly used to finish tables and other wood surfaces; it adds water resistance and protection without much color.
It barely changes the color but gives the wood a slight wet, soft look.
Apply beeswax with a rag — work it into the surface.
And the shelf is fully built.
Mounting on the Wall
Now to attach the shelf to the wall.
The mounting location is roughly the dotted area in the photo:
Before screwing the shelf up, locate the wall studs.
A screw driven into a stud holds well, but Japanese drywall (gypsum board) areas without a stud behind them won’t hold a regular screw.
I used a stud finder to locate the studs.
The finder lights up over a stud.
The result: there’s a stud behind the left side of where the shelf will go, but no stud behind the right side.
For the no-stud area (just gypsum board behind), use dedicated drywall anchors so the screws actually hold.
Screw the anchor into the wall with a screwdriver:
Once it’s in, you can drive a screw into it with full holding strength.
Anchors in — time to mount the shelf.
Left side screws straight into the stud, right side screws into the drywall anchor.
The shelf is mounted.
Finished
Done!
Since I had leftover 18 mm panels from the desk build, that’s what I used.
In hindsight, going thinner — 15 mm or even 12 mm — would have given the shelf a sleeker look.
Either way, getting things off the floor and onto a wall shelf made a noticeable difference!
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