Last year Stephen and I picked up this old piano on craigslist.com for free. Sadly, the piano was broken and beyond repair.
Stephen had the brilliant idea of turning the piano into a desk!
Recently, I repainted it black.
Stephen took my little project a bit further by mounting his Apple display to the front of the piano! And he added color changing LED lighting inside and around the back!
I’m really happy with the way it turned out! Changing the colors of the LED’s is lots of fun too!
If you want to make a piano desk, search for free broken piano’s on craigslist.com or yard sales. Take out all of the strings and piano keys (keep the piano keys for a future DIY I’ll be posting!). Then decide what color you want to paint it! I first painted the piano grey, which looked really nice when I was using it, but I knew my husband would enjoy it better if it was black. After your paint is dry make sure you spray it with a clear coat of acrylic.
As for mounting the screen, I have no idea how Stephen did that. Perhaps I’ll ask him to guest post sometime to tell us how he did it! Would anyone be interested in that?
Cheers!
Wow! That is a FABULOUS project. I love desks. And I always think pianos are so pretty, though I don’t play. I’ll be keeping an eye out for a sad piano to bring home one of these days.
Thanks Amanda! I think pianos are pretty too! I hope you find one :)
absolutley wonderful! I love the new blog layout! Sorry if I am late on that :)
Thank you! You aren’t late, the new look has only been up for a few days!
I think this is such an ingenious idea – it looks so cool!! I can’t wait to see what you’re going to do with the keys! Have you ever watched the movie Becoming Jane? I love her piano keys in that movie because the regular keys are black and the sharps and flats are white – so cool!
Thanks Amber!! i love Becoming Jane!
Gorgeous!!!
Thank you Elizabeth!
This needs to be pinterest famous.
Ha! thanks Rachel :)
you people are so creative and unique!!!! This is awesome!!!
Thank you Victoria!
Such a fantastic idea. I love the contrast of the fancy white cutouts against the black. It looks great.
Thank you!
As an Emacs user, I can’t believe you removed the most important feature: the pedals!
VIM ;)
Super clever! Glad to see something old being repurposed into something new…
Thank you Valerie!
Thank you!!! We were about to list our 1921 Knabe on Craigslist for next to nothing; you’ve saved it! It will be a desk like this by Xmas – my wife just measured the space in our bedroom, it’ll fit. Yay! Thank you again!
Oh wow! That’s fantastic! You’ll have to share pictures when you’re finished!
Would LOVE to see a detailed how-to on creating a piano desk.
It looks beautiful and minimalist all at once. Great re-purposing concept.
I did a pretty quick overview in a reddit comment: http://www.reddit.com/r/DIY/comments/xgno0/make_a_desk_out_of_a_piano_piano_desk/c5mgp9w
We didn’t take any shots during the actual conversion unfortunately. Maybe we will have to acquire another piano from Craigslist!
How is that desk ergonomically? Is the monitor not too high up to work from comfortably?
I’m 24 and don’t believe in ergonomics :) Seriously though, not as bad as it looks. The chair in the shot is a bit low. Eyes meet the screen a little above the middle which is more comfortable than looking down at a notebook on the table like I’m doing right now. The vertical pitch of the monitor is surprisingly nice as well.
Nicely done!
Wow- what a great idea, and it looks so GOOD. I agree with doing a little more and taking the cords all to the back.Would like to know how you attached the screen.
GREAT JOB
This is one of the coolest up-cycle ideas I have ever seen! Great one-of-a-kind look! Im gonna look for one to make myself!
I love this you both have wonderful visions, oh and thanks for making it even harder now for me to find a free old piano on CL :) I have been watching for one for a while now lol.
I agree on hiding the wires and I would have Stephen cut an area below in that panel for the wonderful carved piece he removed for the monitor then put the bass speaker there :)
Now can you make a bench of some kind from the top piece that open to the keys that you removed and incorporate the ivory keys in the bench?? That would look amazing :)
Ani
Looks interesting. My only concern is the monitor appears to be positioned in a way that it would be too close to comfortably read when you reach for the keyboard?
I’m currently in the process of turning an old piano into a desk. I just wanted to know what you were planning on doing with the keys. Looking forward to your next DIY!!
Oh, and I am SUPER interested in how he mounted the computer!!
Thanks!!
Samantha
Wow! I really want to do this myself. Great project idea, also an amazing execution. I really like the way that mirror gives the desk an expansive look.
silly me, that’s not a mirror.