While I was in Greece, my husband Greg went to work on the long list of things we needed to finish up for the YBC Home/Office tour. We had gone shopping, when we first moved in, for bar stools, but we couldn't find anything we liked at a price point we were comfortable with. Greg felt like he could just make what we wanted, so I told him to go for it. The end result came out so awesome, and since we have been featuring DIY projects on here, I thought I'd invite Greg to guest post explaining how he made them. Hope you enjoy.

Just having moved into our new home, we were still trying to get all the finished touches done. We got the necessities like a couch, a bed, and Candace's desk and office chair, and next on the list was somewhere to sit. I decided to make these bar stools because I thought they'd go well in our industrial place that has high ceilings and exposed pipes, etc. I couldn’t believe how easy it was to assemble these bad boys. The only downside was the price. Part of the reason we did a DIY was to save money but they were about $110 each so we didn't actually save any money. Oh well, they still came out great.

What You Need for DIY Industrial Bar Stools

- 1 – round wooden seat

- 4 – 1/2″ floor flanges

- 8 – 1/2″ x 12″ pipes

- 4 – 1/2″ x 3″ pipes

- 5 – 1/2″ x 4″ pipes

- 6 – 1/2″ tees

- 8 – 1/2″ 90° elbows

- 8 – 1/2″ close nipples

- 4 – 1/2″ caps

- 5 - Glue

Here are some tips to help make the building process a little easier.

Remove all the sticks and bar codes prior to putting the stool together. I learned the hard way and believe me, it was a pain in the ass to get the stickers off. I finally had to go out and get something to get them off and wound up using “goof off” to help remove all of the adhesive from the pipes.
Use a pair of vice grips to help you gain leverage when tightening the pipes into the proper alignment. This project technically doesn’t require any tools, you simply screw the pipes into place, but the vice grips made my life a whole lot easier.
Do not screw on the end caps on the bottom of the legs until the end. This will allow you to screw the caps to the desired hight to ensure the stool is balanced.
In this project I used a strong glue to connect the wooden seat to the floor flanges, but if you are concerned with a strong hold, you can buy wood screws to secure your seat to the flanges.

Instructions for DIY Industrial Bar Stool:

Step 1:

Attach a 12″ pipe to a tee. Add a close nipple to the end of the tee opposite the 12″ pipe. Add a 90° elbow to the close nipple. Add a 3″ pipe. Add another 90° elbow. Add a 12″ pipe (here you can replace the 12” pipe with anything shorter like a 5” pipe depending on how high you need your stool). Add a cap.

Step 2:

Repeat this process 3 more times creating the other three legs.

Step 3:

Add a close nipple to the open end of the tee in each leg. Connect both legs with a tee in the middle of the close nipples you just added.

Step 4:

Recreate what you just did in step 3 with legs 3 & 4.

Step 5:

Use a 4” pipe to connect the two sets of legs. If you are building a taller stool like the one I did in the post. I would recommend a 5-6 inch pipe in this step to create a wider base for better stability.

Step 6:

Connect the floor flanges to the tops of the legs.

Step 7:

Apply glue to the floor flanges and attach the wooden seat. (Option to buy wood screws and screw the seat into place with the floor flanges)

You then have the option to decorate, paint or stain your wooden seat.

Step 8: (optional)

Apply your adhesive fabric pads to the bottoms of your leg caps to help protect your floors.

These stools were very simple to make and I was surprised at the cost. Again, depending on how tall you need your stools, you can build a stool approximately 21” high for around $55. The one I built here in the project was 31” high and cost me approximately $110.

When deciding on the desired hight of your stool, just know that the 4” pipes for the bottom base length created a stool height of about 21-22 inches. I used 12” pipes on the bottom base of the legs creating a stool approximately 29-30 inches tall.

DIY Industrial Bar Stool

What You Need for DIY Industrial Bar Stools

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