Malm Toddler Bed under Malm-inspired Bunk

Materials: Malm Bed and Dresser

Description: After being inspired by so many cool projects on this website, hoping my daughter would sleep in her own room, and deciding I didn't want to pay $2500 for kids' bunk beds I came up with a design to use used Malm items to make my kids a new bedroom set.

This was a combination of three easy hacks and one harder one requiring actual building. I got two used Malm beds, and a used Malm dresser. I used the two headboards from the beds to make my toddler's bed- simply replacing the footboard with the second headboard, so she couldn't scoot off the bottom of the bed and under the bunk by accident. I used the rails and slats from the second bed on the upper bed that I built to match the Malm beds- the headboard, footboard, and stair wall are 2" thick, and the headboard is the same height above the mattress as the Malm headboard. To fit in my space the upper bunk is narrower than Malm - only 41", and the upper bed is longer than Malm -77" so that I could fit both the Malm bed and Malm dresser underneath.

The stairs are drawers - inspired by Berg furniture for kids, but I also thought about using a modified Trofast stair system. I wanted the furniture to match existing paint, and using recomendations from this site to use special primer and extra long screws, I painted all pieces bright white, and attached knobs to the Malm dresser.

~ Ellen Farrow, Los Gatos, CA