When my friend asked me to help her build an upholstered headboard for her & her fiancé’s new apartment, I said yes, of course! I was super excited to help with this project because I haven’t built a headboard from scratch and felt like it would be a great project to tackle! My friend had researched some headboard ideas before starting this project and stumbled upon two different styles she liked.
She couldn’t decide between the square headboard with buttons
or the curved headboard with nailhead trim.
Eventually we decided to go with a mix of both: a square headboard with nailhead trim.
Here is what you’ll need:
Batting
Foam (the thickness is a matter of preference)
Adhesive Spray
Staple Gun
Plywood (we used 3/4 in thick plywood)
Fabric (obviously)
Chalkbox(obviously)
Nailhead Trim
Because of all the coupons we had, we were able to build this headboard for under $120!
STEP 1: We got the plywood cut to the dimensions we needed while we were at Home Depot, so the first step for us was attaching the foam to the plywood using adhesive spray.
STEP 2: After letting the adhesive dry for a bit we attached the batting using a staple gun. We “wrapped the corners like a present” to make sure they lay flat.
STEP 3: We attached the fabric using the same method. Make sure you pull the fabric extra tight the entire way around to avoid pulling or extra fabric hanging.
STEP 4: This step was the trickiest. It was hard to measure out where to place the nailhead trim so it would be even and straight on all sides since there is no straight edge to go off of. We ended up rough measuring the distance from the edge, and then used a chalkbox to create a straight line where the nailhead trim would go. After that we used the staple gun to push the foam and batting down so the nailhead trim wouldn’t pull away from the board.
STEP 5: After going over the chalk line with the staple gun, we nailed down the nailhead trim.
And that’s it! The headboard turned out even better than we had expected! It was much more affordable than buying a headboard and it only took us a few hours to complete!
