Scavenger Chic

Recycled Tin Shingles Headboard

• By Joan
• June 20, 2016
• 9 Comments

I love to make headboards and they are probably my second most favorite thing to make…coffee tables being number one.  The problem is, you can only have so many headboards sitting around, so when son #2 said he was actually in need of a headboard my ears perked right up.

You do?  Would that be a king or queen?

So a couple of months later with my sons birthday and his wife’s birthday both coming up within a week of each other, I decide to go ahead with the headboard but first I had to nail down the color.

Hypothetically speaking, if you were to chose between a white, black or some other color headboard, what would you choose?

Hypothetically, whatever matches elephant gray. (the color of his walls)

You gotta pick. Ask Mollie (his wife)…hypothetically of course.

Off Whitish or white.

Awesome choice, just in case.

Elephant tusk white would match elephant skin.

Did I just butt dial you?

Could you tell, this was our actual texting conversation? And for some reason they weren’t the least bit surprised when I actually gave them a headboard for their birthdays.

The headboard I’m building is for a queen size bed. I started my headboard by laying out all my pieces on the floor. I knew I wanted to use up some of my tin roofing shingles and building off of them I also wanted the shiplap look that seems so popular right now. 

For the horizontal boards, there are 4, 1×6’s measuring 60″ each and 1, 1×8 also 60″ (the second board from the top is the 1×8).

For the sides, there are 2, 1×4’s measuring 40 3/4″.  What you don’t see from the front are 2 more 1×4’s made of scrap pallet wood positioned so that the horizontal, shiplap boards are sandwiched in between.

An eight foot 4×4 post, cut in half will be the support posts for the bed and I used a 69″, 1×6 for the top ledge.  

Two pieces of 1×2’s will be sufficient to cover the top and bottom parts of the tins.

The blocks in between the tins are there just to see if I can cover the gaps with a 1×4.  That works.

The scrap piece of molding up against the top ledge was a piece I pulled out of my son’s basement that we’ve been demolishing. It was originally part of a knotty pine club basement straight out of the 50’s.

For the most part I used a nail gun to nail the sides (including the pallet wood on the back) to the ship lap boards.  Not really sure why there is a regular hammer in the pic, maybe I was pulling a nail out.

Use a tape measure to make sure the tins are evenly spaced. Cover the tops and bottoms of the tins with the 1×2’s and nail into place.

Because the 1×2’s can’t lie flat because of the tin shingles, they are going to stick up a bit. Easy to fix, just sand down the excess.

Did you think I would have a project where I didn’t use pallet wood?  Well, I did say I used it on the back, but you haven’t seen those pieces.  My pallets are making an appearance as the dividers between the tins.

Now you can see the back pallet pieces.

While I had used finishing nails for the  1×4’s on the front, to make the headboard extra secure, I used long wood screws, through the back side pallet pieces. 

My 4×4’s were really rough, as were the pallet pieces, so I took this opportunity to give everything a good sanding.

The 4×4’s are attached to the headboard with 4, 6 inch lag screws. Predrill your holes making sure the screws go into the area of the headboard where there are 3 thicknesses of wood.

The top of the headboard was screwed on and the little piece of molding I had rescued was nailed on with finishing nails.

Fill in any nail holes with wood filler and any gaps with paintable caulk.  Anything that still needs to be sanded, now would be the time to sand.

Painted with white semigloss trim paint.

After one coat of paint I noticed that a bit of the rust was bleeding thru the paint on the tins where I didn’t want it to bleed. I ended up spraying the tins with a coat of polyurethane. So far, I haven’t noticed any additional bleed.

I also didn’t like the gaps around the tins so they got hit with a bit of caulk.

Any other wood bumps were sanded off and the headboard got it’s second coat of paint.

Finally finished painting and those tins got a little bit of sanding to highlight their character sometimes known as rust.

So I took the headboard into one of my bedrooms and set the whole thing up.

And you know what? I thought it needed something. I thought it needed another top ledge like my This End Up beds.

What do you think?  The perfect finishing touch.

My son and his wife received the headboard on Father’s Day which just happened to be my son’s actual birthday this year. I think they liked it but it’s still sitting in my dining room until we happen to have an empty car so that we can make a delivery.

Have a wonderful week and stay inspired.

Update:  The headboard did stay in their elephant skin master bedroom for a while until they upgraded to a bed with under bed storage.  Now it’s relegated to the guest room with another project, side tables made from upcycled dresser drawers.

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