15 Nightstands That Are Not Your Average Bedside Tables

Thinking beyond the expected is what gives a room personality and makes it look truly designed. One spot where designers and homeowners like to ditch the typical home-furnishings shopping experience and experiment is with nightstands. Bar carts, vintage display shelves from the hardware store, furniture intended for seating or storage, and all kinds of other things are filling in at the bedside around Houzz these days. Heck, we even spied a bale of hay with a lamp on top of it. If you’re in need of bedside tables or just looking to switch things up, take a look and see if any of these spark an idea.

Now, let’s get the business out of the way first. While lots of unique items can make interesting bedside table replacements, you also need to make sure they’ll function.

The two most important functional considerations for bedside tables are surface area and height. What do you like to keep within reach of your bed? Do you have enough room for your books, water, docking station, lamp, flashlight, perhaps a box for items you’d rather keep concealed? Will you be placing a reading lamp on top of the nightstand? If so, how high do you like your lamp to be when you read in bed at night? Do the math and make sure your light source will be high enough. If you have room only for a small nightstand surface, consider a wall-mounted sconce instead of a table lamp.

OK, now that the technical part is out of the way, let’s look at creative ideas for nightstands.


1. Special antiques. This old Dutch Boy paint display stand makes an artful nightstand. It provides plenty of shelf space for books, water, a vase of flowers and a lamp, and its height stands up to the scale of the tall four-poster bed.


2. Concrete blocks. In case you don’t have weekends free for antiquing, or pickers combing the Brimfield Antiques Show for you, your find needn’t be as rare as the antique Dutch Boy paint display. It can be as easy as cleaning off some of those concrete blocks from the storage area.

I know, if you’d suggested concrete blocks to me while I picked your brain for nightstand ideas, I would have shuddered from a dorm room flashback and replied, “Blech!” But these look just right in this room. And they have nifty cubbies for stashing stuff. I promise to hold off on the milk crates in this story, even though I did come across a few good examples.


3. Hay bales. It really does not get any more country than this. Of course, I am not sure that an acrylic top will protect anyone with allergies from sneezing all night long, so choose this one with caution.


4. Trunks. These are great old standbys, as their flat tops allow plenty of room for lamps and books, while they can provide bonus storage for linens, favorite magazines, toys, off-season clothing and more. Got a trunk with a curved top? It’s not an issue — just turn it on its side.

By the way, there are a handful of clever design tricks in this room. The twin beds share one custom headboard, for example, which gives them a cohesive look. And the shelves are equipped with elegant strip lights that glow.


5. Tray tables. The best thing about these tables is that they have raised edges. This means that when you plunk down your change, lip balm tube or earrings, they won’t get knocked onto the floor and lost when you reach for the snooze button in the morning.

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6. Tool cabinets. The crisp utilitarian look and bold colors of Craftsman tool chests make them work really well outside the workshop.


7. Side chairs. At the 600-square-foot cottage I stay in on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, half of the dining chairs are stored in bedrooms because there is no room for them when the dining table’s leaves are down, and there’s no room to move around when the leaves are up. If space is tight all around the house, this game of musical chairs will work out. Just know that before dinner, whatever you have stacked on there will get thrown on your bed!


8. Kitchen carts. This charming little retro turquoise cart can be rolled right up to the bed. Any style of bar cart would work the same way.

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9. Stools. There are funky stools for a range of heights, from milking stools all the way up to bar stools, and they all make good nightstands, depending on how high your bed is. This one with a woven top adds some interesting texture to this room.

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10. Antique school desks. These nostalgic pieces have an industrial look, thanks to their metal legs and shelf, softened by a limed oak top. With just one open shelf, they don’t make the bedroom feel like an office.


11. Stacks of books. This is easy if you’re a big reader, because a bunch of books is a regular sight next to your bed anyway. Just prioritize stability over the order you want to read them in and make sure the stack won’t topple.

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12. Drop-down desks. When twin beds share a nightstand, it’s important to remember it will need to serve two people. This handy piece provides plenty of surface area. The best part is, when you don’t want to look at something it’s holding, like the clock that’s telling you it’s way too early in the morning, you can shut it up inside.


13. Stacks of vintage suitcases. It just wouldn’t be a Houzz creative-nightstands story without including a stack of vintage suitcases, now would it? But I will give you a fresh photo we haven’t seen in 10 other articles already. This one is great because the height of the stack is just right and the use of the three main tones is very pleasing — it has a sort of Wes Anderson thing going on.


14. Drop-leaf tables. The great thing about these tables is that they are unobtrusive, but the leaf can be pulled out to create a workspace, then tucked away at bedtime.


15. Wooden crates. A simple vintage piece turned on its side has just the right look for the old-new mix in this bakery-turned-loft in Brooklyn, New York.


Your turn: Have you been using something interesting as a nightstand in your bedroom? Please tell us about it in the Comments section, and if possible, share a photo.

More: Key Measurements to Help You Design Your Dream Bedroom

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