What happens when you make the transition from living in a house with crumbling foundation and four other people into a multi-level rental with original hardwoods, built ins, and an open concept floorplan? (Just kidding, there’s no open concept floorplan.) You actually enjoy where you’re living, and need to find some nice stuff to fill up that place stat.

We quickly discovered that nice, new furniture was not so nice to our wallets, so we opted for the next best option – refinishing what we had…and adding hairpin legs. I will preface this by saying that we are not professionals, but, this coffee table project turned out surprisingly well for novices.

Here’s the inspiration for our table, about $650 above budget.Here’s our version!

Guess what this piece of wood was originally? The top of a piano. Luckily, some parents just have these lying around in their basements. After stripping off the black veneer, we were greeted with this gorgeous wood. We kept things simple and applied a water resistant varnish.

Our only investment (besides time) was purchasing these glorious hairpin legs for extra oomph. We are devout believers of hairpin legs. Do yourself a favor and stick them on something.