The Community Desk Project

[Since this was originally published, we have launched a formal non-profit project which you can find by going to www.communitydeskproject.org. Thank you all for such amazing support.]

For two weeks now, Sonya and I have been building and donating desks to local students who need a personal space for studying and for attending virtual classes. The desks are simple yet functional. They are given out sanded, ready-to-paint, with the expectation that students will want to customize them on their own. We have been blown away by some of them so far.

The basic kid’s desk was designed by Marc Spagnuolo, a.k.a. The Wood Whisperer and is copyrighted by him. A video showing its construction can be found at the link via YouTube. The desk is 24×16 inches on the surface and is 24 inches high. I designed a chair to go along with the desks which, due to the extra complexity in making it, some may choose not to build. I did this because, at least here in Santa Fe, NM, finding a kid-sized chair in any local store was impossible when I went looking.

The idea behind the desk and the chair is that they are extremely inexpensive and easy to build. The kid-size desk/chair combo costs about $45 in lumber.

I scaled up the kid’s desk for a version suitable to older students through high school age. The dimensions of that desk are 30×20 inches, 31 inches high. I did not design a chair for this desk since there are many normal-sized chairs available for purchase, comparable in price for what you could make one. The student-sized desk costs around $30 in lumber to make, or $25 if you use a full sheet of plywood and make three such desks at a go.

Here are links to the two sets of plans, one for the kid’s desk/chair combo and the other for the student desk.
Kid’s Desk & Chair Combo Plans
Student Desk Plans

Finally, we’re putting out a call for volunteers. I can make around 6-10 desks per week but that requires all my spare time, including weekends. We could use some extra woodworking help if anyone would like to participate. Thus far we have purchased the material ourselves. We are working out an arrangement where Home Depot can donate the lumber for future desks and I will have more to say about that later. Our main concern at this point is that the waiting list for desks is much longer than our ability to churn them out.