Designing Furniture for Children

David Agnew

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Hi, I'm looking for guidance designing drawers for children.

One of my co-workers has asked me to build a bookshelf with two drawers in the bottom for large format or extra thick (think pop-up) books. I've been designing away at it and it occurred to me that the kiddos could get their fingers caught in the drawers.

Is there a 'best practice' for drawers in kids' furniture? Full overlay? Inset? Something else? I Googled and it seems manufactured furniture is all over the map.

I'm not using fancy ball-bearing slides, just the standard center under mount roller track-style. I could switch to traditional hardwood slides, I guess, which I think would lessen the chance of them slamming the drawers on themselves by making them harder to open/close. I don't think my co-worker is going to want to spring $30/drawer for soft-close slides.

Thanks!
 
I don't know of specific standards for that sort of thing but two thoughts come to mind. First would be to make the drawers as trays with no real front. Maybe more like the slide out trays sometimes used in kitchen cabinets like this:


My other thought is to make the drawers to suit the design of the piece and let the kids learn to keep their fingers out of the way. I probably learned to keep my fingers out of closing drawers when I was a tot as did my siblings and nearly every kid for generations. We never made any concessions for our son with doors and drawers. He pinched his finger in a bifold door once (and only once) but he was none the worse for wear afterward. You probably learned that way, too.
 
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all my siblings, all my friends and their siblings, we all grew up in the 50s and 60s and I don't think anyone worried about us getting our fingers caught in drawers.
there were so many other things we could hurt ourselves with, like car doors, stoves, knives, stairs, walking in the street, backyard pools, etc.
I don't think my parents worried one tiny bit about our pajama drawers hurting us.

I say don't overthink it. Stick to what you design and Im sure your friend will love it.

btw, my daughter is a special ed teacher with 4-8 y/o students, and there are tons of drawers in her classroom, regular drawers, some with slides, some without.
 
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Ha ha. A lot of "grumpy old man" in this thread. Yes, I did grow up in a house designed and built in the 60's. There was probably lead paint on my bedroom walls, I owned a set of Lawn Darts, and I even take the guard off my TS occasionally. My thought is that if a simple design change can save some childhood trauma, there's no reason not to do it.

I really like the open tray idea and will float it my him. The currently trendy "basket as a drawer" idea was nixed during initial design. The height design piece was interesting, but I hope never to be asked to build a bunch of child furniture! :)
 
Not so grumpy. I appreciate your sentiment of reducing childhood trauma. Fortunately most of those kinds of traumas are short lived and quickly forgotten.

Another thing you might consider is looking at ways to make the piece little kid friendly now but converting into something appropriate for the kid when they get older, too.
 
The only thing I could suggest is to tether or anchor the bookcase to the wall so it doesn't tip over on the kids if they stand on the bottom drawer.

Ive made furniture for 6 kids and 13 grand kids. No life changing traumas from pinched fingers yet:rolleyes: I do round over corners on tables though. I learned that from when I got 6 stitches on my head when I was a little kid:thud:
 
David - Yup, I'd thought of building it in a way that could be "aged up" somehow, but I'm not creative enough. I'd like to do it, but don't see how.

Bob - That is a concern. I turned a 60" dresser over by climbing it when I was around 9. However, it's paint grade, so the bottom and drawers will be made from 3/4" and 1/2" MDF, so I expect it to be bottom heavy. Imagine this, but with two drawers at the bottom. Only around 34-35" tall, about 16" deep at the bottom...

Modern-Childrens-Bookcase-and-Book-Display-by-Inaiinaiba.jpg


Thanks for the ideas, guys. We're getting together for beers on Wednesday, so I'll have some designs on Thursday.
 
This is what we decided on.

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3/4" MDF for the sides and bottom shelf. Everything else is 1/2" Baltic Birch from the BORG. Inset drawer using a cut-out handle inspired by Dave's tray suggestion. Using a pair of undermount roller slides for the drawer which will use 1/2" BB for the bottom also. Main design purpose of the drawer is for large format books, so I expect lots of weight to be there. Hand painting the sides, the children's names will also be stenciled on. The photos on the sides are actually going to be in modified frames so the photos can be updated as the years go by.

This is paint grade for young kids, so the joinery will be cringeworthy to many here. Drawer will be dadoes, rabbits, and brads. Everything else will be a liberal application of pocket screws (I can't believe I just admitted that). I don't have the time, energy, or tooling for dovetails and accurately dadoing-in the upper shelving.

Should be picking up material tomorrow. Due to my schedule, I'm estimating a week for cutting and construction. Due to the weather, I'm estimating 2 weeks for the painting.... garage is only about 60 degrees and I'm worried about the paint drying time.
 

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...This is paint grade for young kids, so the joinery will be cringeworthy to many here. Drawer will be dadoes, rabbits, and brads. Everything else will be a liberal application of pocket screws (I can't believe I just admitted that). I don't have the time, energy, or tooling for dovetails and accurately dadoing-in the upper shelving...

Oh, the humanity! :eek: :rofl:

Seriously, dadoes, rabbets, brads and pocket screws sound perfect for what you're building, in my opinion. :thumb: And I don't think there are many woodworkers here (including some who are much better at it than I am) who would disagree with me on that point. You may get some grief on other forums, but I don't think you'll find many joinery snobs here. ;)
 
Looks like a neat design. You might give some thought to making it so it can be knocked down for storage. I built a cradle boat for my son and my wife insists we save it for a potential grandkid but it isn't easily stored. My brother built a cool rocking airplane for Ian, too. It is kind of hard to store as well but I don't want to get rid of it.

 
Looks like a neat design. You might give some thought to making it so it can be knocked down for storage. I built a cradle boat for my son and my wife insists we save it for a potential grandkid but it isn't easily stored. My brother built a cool rocking airplane for Ian, too. It is kind of hard to store as well but I don't want to get rid of it.


You need one of them folding dogs. Storage problem handled. :thumb:
 
man its got to be the color of them that cause them to do silly things.. watched the new movie frozen this wknd and i swear they used some of charlies traits for the reindeer:)
 
Vaughn, a folding dog? Why didn't I think of that. :D

That's my brother's dog, Carrera. Well she's an ex-dog now. She wasn't thrilled to be there but she'd have done anything for him. He said he needed a test pilot.

that reindeer was kind of funny. I wish they'd put a little more into when he had his tongue stuck to the rail.
 
Thank you for the kind words, everyone. I'll post back in 7-10 days when I have progress.

David - Why do you always come up with great ideas that I don't know how to implement?? :D Only way I can think of making it knock down is using cam locks and dowels. That's an additional cost (goal is to build this custom unit for about 150% of a production shelf unit) and I've got zero confidence in my ability to get the opposing holes for the cams and the dowels to line up correctly. I can't think of a way to make wedges work... any other ideas or alternatives?
 
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