I Build $3,000 Pottery Barn Outdoor Chairs For $168

Outdoor patio furniture is getting ridiculously expensive. And for something that lives outside, it doesn't last many years. So, I went ahead and found this set for $3,000. Well, in today's video, I'll be building each chair for under 50 bucks. And we're only going to build it with only two power tools. Let's get into it. All right. To get started, here are supplies. We have 2 by sixes. We have 2x8s. Three 2x six's. Two 2x8s. That should get the party started. Let me show you where we're thinking about putting this. About 4 weeks ago, I built this giant 300 ft paver patio pad for this fire pit. And then about 2 weeks later after that, I built this smokeless fire pit. And yes, it is smokeless. And yes, both videos are up on my channel. You should go definitely check them out. So, what I'm thinking is we built four beefy outdoor patio chairs is going to go around here. This is going to make great for hanging out with the kids, grilling s'mores, late nights with friends. I could not be more excited about this little entertainment section that we're going to make many memories. Let's start cooking up some furniture. Now, I know I have a full shop with every power tool that's needed to build almost anything. And not a lot of people will have that opportunity or access to those tools. That's why we're only going to be building with two tools, a circular saw and a drill. The foundation of any power tool arsenal anybody could have in their home. And we're doing this to make it more accessible for everybody to build. And for me, it's going to be kind of tough not to use all these tools. But let's get into it. First order of business, start chopping our stuff up. But before we can get started, we need our fuel. Fuels in. Let's slice nice, baby. What you're seeing here is all the rough cuts that we'll need to get this job done for one chair. And I went ahead and made PDF plans for you to follow to build this exact set at home. So, I'll put a QR code right here if you want to scan that as you're binge watching on your couch or your bed all your favorite shows, including this channel. Scan it and I'll make sure to send you the plants via email. Now, moving along, let's start working on our legs. First, these are 40-inch long pieces. If you saw on the PDF plans, we're going to have to make a couple unique cuts here. First, we're going to have to make a little bevel on the bottom here. And that bevel will be our K as is as it's tilted up. This kind of like an Anderand chair, right? So, that's 164°. I already figured all the fancy degrees for you. And then one up front. And the one up front is going to be 110°. And at this point, we're just going to trim that off with our circaw. Uh, it's really hard to make a really straight cut. So, what I found is that if you can figure out a system to replicate your cut every single time, life will be so much easier. In this situation, you can either cut on the line or outside the line. They say save the line, meaning the line's still etched on the ground on your piece. That's my recommendation. That's the way I like to do it is I save the line. That way I know that in case my blade moves a little bit, as long as my line's there, I could always fine-tune, fine cut that remainder little piece or maybe even sand it close enough. Now, I designed this particular set to have the highest point of the seat to be 16 in off the ground, which I found's the most loungeable distance from the ground. So, right now it's probably at 15. By the time we have more stuff on top, that'll be 16. We have our can here. Now, let's get our seats. I found it that working on the bottom seat part/ leg, I guess, works the most efficient. So, I have my three pieces that are 2x8s for the bottom part. I have my long sides here. I kind of like to flip them upside down. Also, check make sure you have the cleanest side of the 2 by material, the one that has like the least imperfections on it. Like this is a tear out. That's going to be on the bottom. So, put that on top right there. And we're going to space these out kind of like cleats. There's no math equation here. I just kind of picked a number roughly 3/8 to a quarter. So, that looks like about 3/8 there. And then we're going to overhang this just a bit because there's going to be an apron up front here. Think about here, right? There's going to be an apron. You're sitting down like that. So, all we have to do now is lay out where our pocket holes are going to go. Two is going to be enough per side and wood glue. And that's going to give us adequate bottom support to make sure that no matter the weight, this thing is going to hold up. So, I'm using this little scrap piece right there. As you can see, there's overhang here for this apron. And what I want to do is I want to make sure this crease lines up with this crease. And I'll show you how to tighten it up later. But right now, we're strictly looking for alignment. Once you get your first piece started here, you could just space out as you go and you shouldn't have any problems. And in regards to pocket holes, there's many different pocket hole jigs like this, like this, or my pride and joy, the Craig Foreman, which is a pocket hole machine, but you don't need it unless you are like building mass amounts of cabinets, which every once in a while will do. [Music] Get a little bit of this goo on here. I recommend using a Taibon 2 or Taibon 3. It's the strongest stuff, but Tyon 3, which this is not. This is two, is actually waterproof. Uh, so if you really want it to withstand all the crazy weather conditions, I recommend going with that one. But Taon 2 is strong as well. So I'm not going to worry too much about it. [Music] All you want to focus on this part here is making sure that this is all flush. These boards and the end here. If that's the case, you're going to be looking real good how this thing's going to turn out. I promise. All right, we have our bottom basically complete. All we got to do next is put a brace in the back. And the reason the brace is going to go in here is because from here to here, there's nothing reinforcing it. So, as wood moves or moisture gets in or whatnot, even though we're going to seal it, this can start bending in, out, and all that stuff. So, we're going to just put a brace right here. Pocket holes on the inside. Not a big deal whatsoever. [Applause] [Music] Boom. We got ourselves a butt cushion. Let's start working on the sides. The back rest. So, the back rest is I wouldn't say it's tricky, but there is, let's just put it this way. It's unique. The reason it's unique is because the one piece that you're going to cut if you follow the plans. It's going to be 24 in long. That's your 2x6. What I like to do is do an inch and 3/4 spacing on the front and the back. And the reason I'm doing front and back is because it makes it simple math. Put a little straight edge there. Connect line to line. And that is going to be the frame of our back rest. So, we're going to use our cirl that sucker in half. Told you this is easy. Anybody can do it. Any skill level. Whether you're advanced or you're brand new, nothing is too intimidating on this build. [Music] [Applause] I was almost sure we didn't cut into my table, but we did. It's all right. It's a workbench. That's what it's meant for. Take abuse. What was once a 2x6 is now a perfectly mirror image of our side frame. Now, as you can see, there's a a more of an angle on one side than the other, right? So, this is the 90 and this is whatever angle that is. So, what we're going to use is this part that we cut where the blade went. And that's going to be the front facing part of our back rest. And the reason I went with this style is because you have a little bit more lean to it. Everybody needs a little more lean in their life. Isn't there like a a drug like a drink with like cough syrup called lean? Okay. You you can use a little bit less of that kind of lean, but more of relaxation. Threw some pocket holes in the back on these ones. I guess I forgot one piece. And uh because they're facing the back, all the holes are going to be in the back. And I'll show you how we're going to fill those holes so they're not going to be an eyesore. Space them out the same 3/8 with a little piece of metal. And we're only going to need three here. And this little gap, that's intentional. [Applause] [Music] I almost forgot. Very important part just because it's easier to do right now than later. throw a pocket hole on the inside parts of this. We only need one. If you can squeeze two, awesome. But that's going to be the part that actually I wouldn't say holds it in place, but keeps it anchored to the bottom. It's not going to be crazy loadbearing, just enough to keep it from shifting. [Music] And just like that, we have a what I think is a very beautiful back rest. And all we're going to do now is just attach it with pocket screws there to the back uh railing sides that we had. And by the way, I never mentioned this. Pocket hole screws. Get these blue ones for exterior stuff. They're already coated, so they're not going to start rusting on you like crazy. Like I mentioned, you don't need to go crazy and even put a bunch of screws onto this one. It's just anchoring. The angle that it's going to be at is going to be holding the bottom just from sliding out. Really look at these measurements. I mean, it's perfectly on there. Get those plants, guys. These chairs are going to be rad. And by the way, how sick does this look? There's a part of me that's almost contemplating not putting armrests on there just cuz I like how modern and simple this looks like there. But it'd be nice to kind of throw your arms out like on a throne while watching a fire. Maybe smoking a cigar. Maybe a nice little aged uh bourbon. Well, let's finish it. Now, the arms. For the armrest/ legs, uh we're doing a two-piece bottom. So, we have our 2x8 that's split in half. pocket holes to the side like that. And this section is going to be the left side if you're facing out of the chair. This part will attach to the chair, keeping it up in that angled degree that we need. And then we'll put our armrest on top of it and connect that to the back rest, which will keep the back from breaking on you. Don't break your back. to make me the bunk bed. >> You want me to you a bunk bed? What do you need a bunk bed for? You >> remember our old house? You made one side where I play. Remember you made the up room where I play in the bunk? >> Are you talking about the pink bunk bed? The princess bunk bed I made you the one where you had the bed below and then you had stairs and then you had a play area on top. You want me to make that for you again? Interesting. Why do you want me to make you that? >> I just I just I just want to >> You just want to hide up there in the tower. >> Mhm. >> Like a princess. >> Are you a princess? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Give me a kiss. >> All right. I'll make you one. That was not planned. I didn't stage that. She just came in asked me to build her a pink bunk bed that I built her in our previous house, which sucks. We had to leave it there. But I guess we're going to build another one. If you haven't seen that video, it's right over here. Go check it out. Probably to date my absolute favorite build. And the reason it's my absolute favorite built is because, well, I did it for that little girl there. She was only three, maybe two and a half, three when I built it. And now she's five. And that memory stays with her. And hopefully she'll remember that when she's 25, 30 years old. And she's going to ask her husband, "Oh crap, I'm going to cry. Don't Let's not do this. I'm not We're not going to talk about that. Nope. We're just going to build a damn bunk bed again." And that's it. [Music] Well, it's lunchtime. Taking a break. And this is the perfect time to talk about sponsors of today's video, HelloFresh. I believe in second chances, and I'm giving HelloFresh a second chance. Reason why, I'll tell you. Number one, they have larger portions now. Before the portions were a little bit smaller, and I just didn't see the value in that. I am a big boy, and I eat quite a bit. Number two, they have a larger menu selection. If you have kids, you know that things they like varies from day to day. And so with their larger menu selection, you could swap out veggies, you could swap out protein options. It's like having a customizable restaurant at your home. And number three, they have a premium protein selection. Before it was mostly chicken. Well, now there's premium steaks and seafood at no additional cost. What's for lunch, you ask? Peanut pork noodle stir fry. [Music] [Applause] What's great about HelloFresh is that it takes all the thinking out of it. Imagine you're got kids sports in the evening, practice, whatnot. You don't know what to make for dinner. It's going to be bedtime in like 2 and 1/2 hours. So, you just whip out your HelloFresh. You follow the instructions. For a dummy like me, the only thing I used is one measuring cup to get water in there. And that's it. Takes all the guess work away. And let me tell the family it's going to look like this. [Music] I wasn't planning for this much food. I uh if I did, I would have gotten a bigger pan. This is going to feed my family plenty tonight. Plus uh enough for some leftovers. Oh, Bubba. I use HelloFresh and you should as well. Give a second chance to the new HelloFresh. Use my promo code mrbuilditfm at hellofresh.com to receive 10 free meals plus free breakfast for life. One free meal per box with an active subscription. Free meals applied as discount on the first box. New or returning subscribers only varies by plan. Click the link below or use my promo code mrbuildfm@hellofresh.com. Now, let's get back to this video. So, the last thing you need to do to assemble the arms and the legs essentially is put one pocket hole that attaches to the right side of the chair. Pocket holes on the back here to attach this piece on top. Now, you can just drill on top and then fill in the holes, but you're going to get a much nicer look when all the holes are concealed like this. Our big old pile lumber is quickly decreasing. We only have about three more pieces to install here. To install the legs, the easiest way I've kind of figured out is get any scrap piece of wood, pick up until we hit that little bevel that we cut in the back part of the legs, shove it until it's there, and then grab not one but two of your clamps. And again, this method is to make sure that we have the least exposed screws. So then we're going to grab our square, set that there. I like to align this surface with the bottom edge of that piece so nothing is protruding. I'll show you why this is important in a bit. That there. Get our straight edge. Make sure we have a a 90° so it's not beveling out one way or another. Then we're going to take our clamp. Looks about right. Throw a little wood glue in here. Do the same on the other side. And then we're going to flip this over and secure this part from the back of this little side rail. And lastly, the finishing touch, the front apron here. Cut an angle on it. 30°, 45, doesn't really matter. It's not going to match anything. But what you're going to do is you're going to get it under here. Got a couple of pocket holes. We're going to put a couple of countersink screws in here so you won't see them. We'll fill them in. And then we'll pocket hole on the sides and we'll secure that so you won't see those either. [Music] All right, we are looking at Oh, that's nice. $41.25 25 cents of lumber to make this gorgeous and extremely comfortable outdoor patio chair. Now, yes, we're under 50 bucks, but we still have some detail finishing touches to make it look like it did on the pictures of the Pottery Barn stuff. So, let's see what we can figure out about stain. Almost forgot to mention a couple of things for you. All the holes, we plug them up with these pocket hole plugs. They're very easy. You just put glue inside there, glue on here. They only go one way and they practically just slide in place. So that conceals it. I got them here. I got them in the back. I got them underneath here. No holes. Also, the holes that we drilled on top here, I just actually found out this little hack. If you cut off this little bevel here, you can pound in into a counter sunk hole and then use a flush little saw right there. Cut it off, sand it, and you have no holes here as well. Looking phenomenal. One added bonus feature. We're going to have to put a little triangle in here. A little coral if you will, just over time to make sure that this doesn't get to be the weakest point just in terms of bend. That's all. But enough about that. Why don't we get to staining and see if the stain that we got is absolute dog or actually decent. I don't like the looks of this already. It's pure primer white. But a lot of times the sediments kind of settles towards the bottom. So, you really got to mix these things in order to get a true feel for what you're dealing with. Also, I sanded this with uh up to 220. So, 220 grit is what we're looking at right now. Silky smooth, may I add. We're dealing with the bear stain. First time using stain from Bear. Didn't know they make it. It's called white wash pickling. And we just got it at Home Depot. >> So, we're at no other than the Home Depot. We got to pick up whatever stain they have. Uh based off of the pictures that we saw from Pottery Barn, it looked like a white wash but had a lot of natural tones. So, uh, we might have to be a little bit of artistic on the stain job. All right, what do we got here? We have gel stains. These are natural colors. This looks light classic gray, but don't let these colors deceive you. They almost never look the way they do on these samples. These are urethanes. We're going to need some urethane for sure, but I'm not liking a lot of these selections. Oh, I think we found it. It's light. It's white washy. It's got the natural tones. Bear. Bear makes stains now. I have never seen this. Let's see what else we need. We got to find some kind of clear coat. We don't want to use polyurethane cuz the UV rays are going to break it down. I don't like any of these options. This one says interior exterior. Let's try interior exterior and then see how she goes. We'll use a foam foam brush. Um they work well cuz they could suck in or we can use a regular brush, but I think a foam one can put a liberal amount on. All right, I'm going to take Let's do take two of these. I'm wondering if to like play a prank on the kids to just like lay one of these skeletons onto the chair and see if they notice anything. Maybe like dress them up. This is crazy. I love when they have Halloween stuff out. Oh man, if we could have this when we were 12, a big old life-sized doll of Chucky, even better. We can have it when we're 37. This is a business expense. >> It's for my health. >> This outdoor urethane, I'm not too confident how to apply it. Mostly because all of my sprayers are shot and dead or dirty. Uh user mistake me. Uh only one to blame. I can always roll it and brush it. That's going to take forever. I might have to just bite the bullet and buy another spray gun. But we'll cross that bridge when we get there. That's tomorrow. Alex's problem. Today we just got to sand and stain. Oh, this is just what the doctor ordered. Straight to the bloodstream, baby. Woo! Let's stain. >> First time applying stain with a microfiber. So, my biggest concern whenever staining anything is uh the color never really turns out the way you want it to and then when you put clear coat on it, it just turns amberish. And so what I've learned over the years is whenever you use an oil base, it will have the natural amber tones in it. But if you use a waterbased, it does…