Editor’s Note: Sam Ives a.k.a. Xenomma talks about upgrading his home setup from a table with a bunch of controllers on it to a fully fledged studio desk in his journey to building the ultimate controllerist home studio in part one of this “Building a Controllerist Studio” series. 

So you decide you want to upgrade your home studio equipment. We’re talking two new pairs of studio monitors, a custom built mixing desk, an 88 key midi keyboard and some rack mounted hardware to connect it all to. You already own a bunch of midi controllers and already you’re struggling to squeeze it all on your desk. What do you do?… Build a new desk of course!

This is my story of how I went from this:

To this:

Now before we get started here, I should probably let you all know that I am not an experienced carpenter and this would be my first time working on a project of this size. Basically meaning that anyone can do this with the right budget and the right tools!

I spent a good month researching what equipment would best suit my needs. Once I decided on what I wanted and where I wanted it to be I was able draw out some rough sketches:

There were several factors I wanted to include in my design and unlike my old setup where everything in reach was ideal for live jamming, I wanted to build something where everything in reach was ideal for both production and live playing. I wanted a hybrid desk!

When all of the equipment arrived I was able to build a mock-up using the old desk, some furniture and cardboard boxes. This gave me room to test the position of my equipment for the final build:

Once the mock-up was built I was able to take measurements, draw up a new plan and take it into Google Sketchup to design a 3D model of the desk:

With the plans in place, I was able to calculate how much wood I would need for the build and I headed to my local hardware store. I didn’t own a power saw at the time but luckily the guy that works in the lumber department was able to cut  it all for me!

I spent the next couple of days putting the pieces together. Here’s a lovely montage I put together for you:

After the assembly it was ready for a coat of primer, two coats of black paint (with added paint crystals for a little sparkle) and three coats of clear coat:

The desk was finally finished and ready for all of the equipment:

The best thing about this design is that everything I need is within reach. In its current set up it is designed more towards producing. I have recently added the left side desk extension (as pictured in the build process) so I can fit all of the Korg synths and controllers on the left side desk with the Novation controllers, ready for live jamming!

Here’s a list of steps to take if you would like to build something similar:

• An idea of what equipment you would like in your final design.
• Rough sketches of the design and placement of equipment.
• A mock-up of the desk with all of your equipment in place.
• Detailed plans including the measurements of the mock-up.
• 3D plans of the desk. Google Sketch-Up is free for a trial period and is easy to learn.
• Calculations of how much wood you’ll need based on the 3D plans.
• Build, wood fill, primer, paint and clearcoat.

Here is a list of materials I used:

• 3″ x 2″ Whitewood beams for the main structure.
• 2″ x 2″ Whitewood beams for side desk structure, monitor shelves etc.
• 3/4″ Birch Hardwood board for table tops.
• 1/4″ Birch Hardwood board for side and rear panels.
• Premium wood screws of assorted sizes.
• Wood filler.
• Bear wood primer, paint and clearcoat.

And finally a list of tools that I used:

• Power drills with screw bits and countersink drill bits.
• Circular saw.
• Jig saw.
• Sandpaper and electric sander.
• Brushes and rollers for the paint.
• Large tarpaulin.

I still have much to do before my home studio’s finished such as building a wall to close off the studio from the rest of the basement and applying acoustic treatment but we’ll save that for part two…