Recycled Side Table

At work we print a lot of mock-ups on our 36" Epson printer, resulting in A LOT of corrugate tubes just waiting to be upcycled into something clever. A co-worker is using the recycled tubes as a bench in his office, which is a wonderful (and comfortable) edition to limited seating space.

I wanted to make something out the tubes myself, I decided on a side table for my office. Another co-worker took 10 tubes home and cut them in half for me.

I needed a clever way to the paint the inside of the tubes and ended up using a narrow paint roller with a pencil (or dowel) as a handle. If you ask me, it looks like corn on the cob with the yellow paint!

I taped the ends of the tubes (something I rarely take the time to do), to make sure I wouldn't get any paint on the top or bottom side of the tubes.

It was a long process, you can see some in-progress tubes in the background.

Finally, three months later, here's the finished product:


I attached binder clips on the bottom of the tubes to secure the tubes and bought the beautiful turquoise elastic from escidus on etsy to keep the top together. I originally wanted to add a glass table top, but I've come to like it without!


We've also got a bunch of Epson ink cartridges that I'm excited to upcycle! Check out some fun ink cartridge lamps at boxlightbox!