• Home
  • Blog
  • About Me
    • Contact Me
      • Advertise
      • Privacy Policy
  • Shop

The Wood Grain Cottage

  • Seasonal
    • Spring
    • Summer
    • Fall
    • Winter
  • Project Gallery
    • Remodeling
    • DIY Projects
    • Decorating Ideas
    • Furniture Makeovers
    • Sewing
    • Gardening
    • Recipes
    • Organizing
  • Home Tour
    • Our Current House
    • The Original Wood Grain Cottage
  • Shop Our Home
    • My Amazon Storefront
DIY· Projects

The Office Desk: The Finishing Details

March 17, 2017

All week I’ve been sharing our tutorial on how we’ve built our new office desk, and today I’m sharing the last part, which is all about the finishing details.

I couldn’t be happier with how the office desk has turned out. It solves so many of our past office issues just by providing a bigger work space and more storage options… both of which we desperately needed. Here’s the final installment on how we built the desk…

When we left off earlier this week, I shared how we installed the countertop portion of the desk…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

After the countertop was installed, we had a few projects left to make the desk look “finished”. You can see from the picture above that our filing cabinet wasn’t as deep as the countertop, leaving a large gap between the wall and the back of the filing cabinet. You can also see that there was a large gap where the countertop met the wall. Because our wall wasn’t straight, we’d also need to find a solution to fix the large, unsightly gap. Here’s how we finished it off…

Please note: Some of the links in this post are affiliate links, which allows us to make a small commission from your purchase, but your purchase price stays the same. Thank you for helping support our blog! We greatly appreciate it! 

SUPPLIES:
  • 1/2″ Quarter Round Material
  • 3/4″ MDF, cut to size
  • 18 Gauge Nail Gun
  • 1 1/4″ 18 Gauge Brad Nails
  • Air Compressor
  • 3″ L Brackets, we bought ours at Ace, but these are similar
  • 7/8″ Wood Screws
  • Table Saw, this is similar to ours
  • Miter Saw, this is similar to ours
  • Circular Saw
  • Screw Driver/ Drill
  • 5/32″ Drill Bit
  • Clamps
  • Tape Measure
  • Caulking Gun
  • Caulking
  • Wall Putty
  • Painters Tape
  • Foam Roller
  • Paint Brush
  • White Paint, I used Super White by Benjamin Moore in satin

First, we started with the gap at the back of the countertop where it met with the wall. It’s normal for walls not to be completely straight, and in a normal countertop situation, the countertops would be scribed to the wall, or basically made to mimic the flow of the wall creating a nice clean edge where everything met. We didn’t want to go through that process, so we decided to cover the gap with quarter round. We looked at a few different options, but quarter round looked the best, was a cheap option and was large enough to cover the gap. Quarter round also gave us a seamless option, as we could cut the length we needed in one full section because of the length of the quarter round pieces offered in store. Once we trimmed the quarter round to size, we used our nail gun to attach the quarter round to the wall…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

On the wall of the filing cabinet, we had the largest gap, as you can see here with the quarter round installed…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Anthony trimmed a small piece of wood and shoved it into the gap, then we used caulking to fill the hole. Problem solved, and it looked so much better. We were both pretty happy to have that part of the job done, especially Anthony, haha!

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

The next step, was filling the nail holes, caulking and painting. I started by caulking the gap along the wall…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Once the caulking was dry, I taped off the counter top and wall in order to paint the quarter round…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then, I brushed on three coats of Super White by Benjamin Moore in satin. It’s very close in color to the countertop, which creates a seamless look…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Last coat in place, I pulled off the tape…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Once the white paint was dry, it was time to touch up the walls. I taped off the quarter round…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

And then added the wall color paint, World’s Away by Valspar…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

I quickly pulled off the tape, leaving a nice clean line…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

I finished my way around the desk top, and the next day we started on finishing the end of the desk. As pretty as that massive gap was, it wasn’t staying. Ha! 😉

To start, we measured the space and then ripped down a piece of 3/4″ MDF…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

With the MDF cut to size, we brought it inside and determined how much of an overhang we wanted on the end of the desk…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

We decided to have it overhang the same distance as the front side with the cabinets (1 3/4″). To attach the MDF, we used the bottom frame of the riser we built, and the top of the filing cabinet. We used our nail gun and nailed the piece in place…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then, because the filing cabinet didn’t run all the way to the wall, Anthony attached two of the 3″ L brackets that we used to attach the countertops to the back inside of the wall. We used screws to attach the bracket to the MDF. I didn’t take any pictures of that because it’s a tiny little space to squeeze into.

Next, we attached the corner of the countertop to the filing cabinet. We decided on anchoring it to the MDF, so we drilled a hole up into the MDF as a pilot hole for the scew…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

And then added a small finishing screw, making sure it didn’t go through the countertop…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

I covered the hole with wall putty, and the nail holes, and then gave the MDF three coats of Super White paint, in satin.

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

And with that, the desk was done! I was finally able to take some tools out of the room and get some decent shots of the space! Here’s how it’s looking!

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

The quarter round made a big difference in finishing off the desk…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

And the end cap made a huge impact too…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

I can’t wait until this room is finished! We are very close!

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Here’s a peek of the wall lights I picked to go above the shelves, now we just need to install them!

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

I still haven’t found a chair, but I moved one from our bedroom into the office to have something to work with. I love the shape, but it’s too bulky to move around, and too short for the desk. It’s super comfy though…

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

The shelves are one of my favorite things about the office. They’re the perfect touch for warming up the room. I can’t wait to get them styled, but in the mean time I’ve been getting a little collection of items together!

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

Next week I’ll be sharing more about the leather pulls we DIY’d, and I’m in love with those too!

Building Our Office Desk by The Wood Grain Cottage

More about the office soon! And just in case you want to see the other two posts on how we built the office desk, you can check them out below…

  • Part One: The Base
  • Part Two: Adding The Countertop

Have a happy weekend! 🙂

 

I’m Shayna… The small town Colorado girl who’s obsessed with home and everything that entails! I’m a creative, a decorator, a day dreamer, a huge fan of scones and I’m passionate about loving where I live and making a home.

Tagged with: office9 Comments

Comments

  1. Erin says

    March 17, 2017 at 1:53 PM

    This might just be one of my favorite rooms yet that you’ve done! I can’t wait to see the finished product, and find out about those amazing leather pulls! Have a good weekend!

    Reply
    • Shayna says

      March 21, 2017 at 2:41 PM

      I totally agree! This room is my favorite too, and the inspiration spring board for the other rooms in our home! 🙂

      Reply
  2. Arell says

    March 17, 2017 at 6:50 PM

    It looks great!!

    Reply
  3. Becky says

    March 18, 2017 at 4:30 AM

    Just beautiful. What a great space to work in!

    Reply
  4. Christine Ralston says

    March 18, 2017 at 10:03 PM

    It looks perfect. What a beautiful job you and Anthony have done! I can’t wait to see how you will finish it.

    Reply
  5. Ashley Brown says

    November 17, 2017 at 12:21 AM

    Looks great. You really did an amazing job.

    Reply
  6. Holly Holty says

    October 26, 2019 at 7:33 PM

    Nice make-over / remodeling!

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Guest Room Plan - The Wood Grain Cottage says:
    March 31, 2017 at 9:31 AM

    […] the office almost done (we only have a few things left to do!), I’m starting to turn my attention to our […]

    Reply
  2. How To Organize Desk Drawers - The Wood Grain Cottage says:
    April 5, 2017 at 9:30 AM

    […] back to the office today, and I’m sharing all about how to organize desk drawers. I desperately needed the desk […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

I’m Shayna… The small town Colorado girl who’s obsessed with home and everything that entails! I’m a creative, a decorator, a day dreamer, a huge fan of scones and I’m passionate about loving where I live and making a home.

Join our newsletter

Search:

Join our newsletter

This past weekend we hit our 2021 house project go This past weekend we hit our 2021 house project goals HARD! With all the bedroom trim done (hallelujah!), we’ll be painting and installing closet doors next! 👏🏻  I always look forward to crossing projects off the list... and finishing our trim has been on there waaaay too long! 😵  #thewoodgraincottage #thewgc #houseremodel #kitchenshelves
Oh those beautiful, twinkling lights... they’re Oh those beautiful, twinkling lights... they’re my favorite! On the blog I’m joining several bloggers and we’re all sharing our night home tours!  If you love the warm twinkle of Christmas lights, you’ll love these beautiful tours! 🎄🌟  #thewoodgraincottage #thewgc #christmastree #christmasdecor #christmasstockings #christmasnightstour #christmasatnight
Our red, white and gold Christmas home tour is on Our red, white and gold Christmas home tour is on the blog! 🎄🌟  This year has been such a fun and special time with the addition of our sweet Ania. She makes us even more excited for Christmas than normal and adding her stocking with ours made my momma heart burst. ❤️  See more of our home on the blog, and be sure to visit all the other beautiful homes on the tour as well!  #thewoodgraincottage #thewgc #christmasdecor #christmashometour #christmastree #christmasdecorations #christmas #christmashome
Next week I’m sharing our Christmas home tour, b Next week I’m sharing our Christmas home tour, but in the meantime, I’ve been spreading Christmas cheer throughout the house! On the blog, I’m sharing my favorite, simple decorating ideas you can incorporate into your home... with the items you already own!  They’re guaranteed to help you add a festive touch to your home! 🎄🌟  #thewoodgraincottage #thewgc #christmasdecor #christmasdecorating #christmasdecorations #easychristmasdecor #christmas
Current mood: Sitting by the Christmas tree lookin Current mood: Sitting by the Christmas tree looking at those pretty twinkling lights! It’s my favorite thing about having the tree up!  #thewoodgraincottage #thewgc #christmasdecor #christmastree #christmastreelights #redchristmasdecor
Happy Thanksgiving! Wishing you a wonderful day ce Happy Thanksgiving! Wishing you a wonderful day celebrating everything we have to be grateful for! My list is long and may I never forget how blessed I am!  #thewoodgraincottage #thewgc #thanksgivingdecor #thanksgivingtable #thanksgivingtablescape
This error message is only visible to WordPress admins

Error: API requests are being delayed for this account. New posts will not be retrieved.

Log in as an administrator and view the Instagram Feed settings page for more details.

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter
  • Shop
  • Email
Copyright © 2021 The Wood Grain Cottage · Custom site by Moonsteam Design · Privacy Policy