One of my first projects was to build a cedar storage bench for the back deck at our house.  I  wanted to avoid the trips to the back of the garage to collect the cushions for the patio furniture, and also give us a place to sit with a coffee in the morning sun.  We had a small table and chairs squeezed in there previously, but got rid of them for the bench.

The design for this was based on some planter boxes that Marc Green had made.  Definitely overkill with the amount of lumber, and definitely harder without a table saw!  The cedar storage bench needed a clear-coat (and admittedly needs another coat now…), to avoid the wood graying, which would have not been a recipe for marital bliss.

I was pretty happy with the end result.  I’m sure there are things I would do differently now, and I’ll likely remake the lid at some stage, but not too bad for a start.  Functional, and (I think) pretty good looking.