Artist and Designer
This laptop stand was a recent personal project. I wanted a laptop stand for my posture but I wanted something a little different from what I was finding. I also had a leftover piece board from a previous project that was just the right size, so I decided to just make one myself.
I broke out my stack of old Conde Nast Travel magazines and my pot of mod podge and got to work. I played around with different colors and photos before I decided on this collage, then used extra text pages to create a uniform border. I liked the juxtaposition of the dramatic black and orange photos with the more lighthearted art clippings.
I had spotted these table legs at home depot and thought they would be perfect for the laptop stand. They came unfinished, so I chose to finish them with a dark stain. I had considered a more orange or red stain but thought that the dark stain would be more timeless. Fun fact, I stained these using a craft pen. I didn’t want a pot of unused wood stain sitting around my small apartment, so I decided to try the pen-form stain. The packaging said it was intended for fixing scratches and small crafts, but it ended up working very well for this project. These legs also unscrew very easily, so the stand is actually surprisingly portable.
This project was really fun to work on since I could use my hands instead of a computer screen. I also found the process of curating and making the collage really enjoyable. I learned that making the best out of what you have on hand can actually turn into something really cool and that taking risks and experimenting helps you create a better product.