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School Desk for Home DIY Reveal

This DIY school desk for home has it all! Three workstations, pegboard for school supplies, lighting, and floating shelves!

DIY school desk for home with Ikea hacked desk and Alex drawer units, 3 workstations, pegboards, and floating shelves

I’ve been working on our homeschool room for a month or two, and it’s finally here! The school desk for home is finished, and I can’t wait to show it to you! Here’s the finished homeschool room if you want to see it.

Now if I could just create a fun homeschool room and not have to actually homeschool, I’d be really happy! But I’m going to try to get myself psyched up for school to start…

Before…

Here’s before. It was a cute playroom once, but it’s been in distance learning room limbo for several months now.

homeschool room before the makeover

Let’s look back at the plan for a moment… a 10-foot-long Ikea-hacked desk with workstations for both girls, and a spot in the middle for me. Ya know, to be sure everyone is actually learning and not just watching YouTube videos of kids unboxing toys!

You can go back read and see more about planning a homeschool room here.

design board with a long school desk for home

Ok, now looking back I remember that I didn’t plan a spot for myself at first. But then I realized I would really need to be right there with them… so I scrapped the plan to put a 3rd filing cabinet in the center to create a 3rd workstation for myself. Now there will be an extra leg for support in the center, since this is a long span.

Accent Wall

We call this room the “front room” because it’s kind of a big awkward room at the front of the house. I think this space was originally intended to be a formal dining room, but since we have a kitchen table, and this is far away from the kitchen, it didn’t really make sense for us to use it that way.

I’ve always wanted to paint a bold accent wall in here, and I finally saw my chance!

I ended up choosing “Beta Fish,” a gorgeous deep green-blue from Behr.

close-up of blue and green paint sample pots for a homeschool room accent wall
teal paint being rolled onto a wall

School Desk for Home

So we got to work building this Ikea-hacked desk. It wasn’t easy to find a 10-foot-long piece of butcher block or even plywood that wasn’t ridiculously expensive, so we had to do some improvising.

Any table top where the kids work is going to get some tough love, so I opted for wood and I varnished the heck out of it!

I used two Alex drawer units from Ikea for the base. I’m a little bit obsessed with them because they look great and they provide some great storage, including a file cabinet.

little girl using a screwdriver to assemble an Ikea Alex drawer unitl for a school desk for home

You can see the full homeschool desk tutorial here! I still have plans to drill holes in the desk top and do some cord control, but I haven’t gotten to that yet. I will update when I do!

This modern homeschool and distance learning room is full of Ikea hacks and organization ideas on a budget! It includes individual workstations, perfect lighting for Zoom meetings, and much more!
It's perfect for older kids and younger kids alike!

Simple Open Shelving

We also built some wood floating shelves to go above it. I need a place to put all my plants, okay? These shelves were pretty simple- and not technically “floating shelves” since they have visible brackets. The shelving tutorial is also coming soon.

wall above school desk for home with DIY floating shelves and pegboards to hold school supplies

IKEA SKADIS Pegboards

We installed three of these SKADIS pegboards from Ikea, which I love. Can you tell? I already have them in my home office/design studio and the kids’ art desks in their bedroom too. So now I have a total of 7 SKADIS pegboards in my house. Hmmmm do you think I might have a pegboard problem?

SKADIS pegboard mounted over a school desk for home with cups for pencils, scissors, and other school supplies

But I really love them because they’re so versatile for organizing kids’ art supplies and office accessories. The cups, clips, clipboards hooks, etc. can be rearranged, and we can pull individual cups down for art projects.

Kids Desk Lighting

One thing I’ve learned in my almost nine years of motherhood, is that table lamps and kids don’t mix. Sometimes they can coexist for a short time, but eventually someone’s going to end up broken on the floor.

Preferably the lamp.

On a kids’ desk top, things are going to get pushed around, and eventually the lamp will get pushed off the desk and/or knocked over. So I chose to prevent this altogether and mount adjustable task lights to the wall.

When I suggested to my dad that we could get wall-mounted task lights that are hardwired in, he didn’t look very happy. So to avoid cutting into the drywall and doing some electrical work, I opted for lamps with plug-in cords.

close up of DIY floating shelves mounted above a school desk for home

It took a surprising amount of research to locate the perfect wall-mounted task lamps with cords that were budget-friendly, in-stock and would look good in our space! Since I’d already gone to the trouble, I figured I might as well share my favorite desk lamps with you.

One of the features I was looking for in lamps was a switch on the fixure itself, and not on the cord. The cords hang down behind the pegboards so the switch would not be accessible.

Kids’ Desk Chairs

Again, the desk chairs took a lot of research. I ended up with these new adjustable-height LOBERGET/SIBBEN kids desk chairs from Ikea.

They have a matching adult-sized one, which sealed it for me. We’ve only had these for a few days, so I’ll update once we’ve had a chance to use them for a while.

Here’s an extensive list of my favorite cute, reasonably-priced kids’ desk chairs in every color and size.

collage of cheap kids' desk chairs in every color
girl working on a laptop computer at a school desk for home

Playroom Rug

I’m loving this fun, colorful rug from ALL Modern! I chose it because it had just the right amount of color and interest, while not totally overwhelming the space. Plus it’s pretty and fun, right?

homeschool room with a long school desk for home with 3 work stations- 1 child working at the desk, and another playing with blocks on the floor

Shop the Room

Here are the inexpensive products I used in the room:

collage of products used a build a DIY school desk for home

A. Industrial Plug-In Wall Sconces, by Chiyan Lighting

B. GU10 LED Lights in White, by AmazonBasics

C. Shelf Brackets

D. Skadis Pegboard, from Ikea

E. Acrimet Wall Mount Pocket File Organizer

F. Luyue Artificial Hanging Plant

G. Watermelon Leaves Artificial Hanging Plant

H. Easy-Change Kids’ Art Frames

I. Wood Letter Book Ends (similar to mine)

J. Onupgo Chalkboard Labels & Chalk Pen

K. Lobberget/Sibben Kids Task Chair, from Ikea (Or check out my kids desk chairs roundup!)

L. Alex Drawer Unit from Ikea

M. I. Behr Marquee Satin Enamel Interior Paint in Beta Fish

How to Set Up A Distance Learning Room- long kids desk with three chairs and workstations

The rest of the homeschool room is finally finished! You can see the whole homeschool room tour here!

More Ideas for Your Homeschool Room…

Easy DIY Floating Desk

Kids’ Art Display Wall

Kids Desk Chairs On A Budget

Toy Storage Ideas: How We Tamed the Playroom Chaos

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18 Comments

  1. Jessica, this looks amazing! You have inspired me to get working on transforming our upstairs playroom. There are so many great ideas in here! Well done!

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