DIY Dog Stairs & Storage Combo for Small Spaces

When your dog deserves a better view and your small apartment needs more storage, you build a sideboard with stairs. This project is the first step (pun intended) in transforming our 10x8 home office into a cozy, creative, and functional space.

This blog post walks through the full process: from planning and design to cutting plywood and laser-cutting stairs. Plus, I share what I learned as someone building furniture for the first time with minimal tools and a healthy dose of YouTube research.

Project Goals & Constraints

We had three main goals for this corner of the office:

Allow the standing desk to move freely without disturbing Mocha.
Use the “negative space” under the desk for hidden but accessible storage.
Create a comfy window perch for Mocha (and visiting family dogs).

And here’s what we were working with:

A 48" wide area between the wall and the desk.
A window sill height of ~26".
A sad little Amazon dog stair setup that needed to go.

Tools & Materials

This was my first time building a piece of furniture from scratch, so I kept the tool list budget-friendly:

Circular saw + aluminum extrusion guide
Orbital sander
Square + clamps
Kreg Pocket Hole Jig
¾” Maple Plywood (prefinished top)
¼” Plywood for sliding doors
⅛” MDF for backing
Satin enamel cabinet paint (Behr)
Iron-on edge banding
Laser cutter (for stairs – more on that below)

Download the plans for this build here:

Designing the Sideboard

I mocked up the design in 3D to make sure everything fit and flowed. The final dimensions:

48” wide
15” deep
26” tall (to match the window)

To keep things looking light and minimal, I went with sliding doors and a clean white finish—plus a maple plywood top to match the rest of the office furniture.

Cutting, Sanding & Painting

![screenshot of cutting plywood]

After optimizing my cut list using CutListOptimizer, I had the plywood trimmed down at the store and did the final cuts at home with the guide rail and saw.

Lessons learned:

Masking tape helps minimize tear-out.
A high-tooth blade = smoother cuts.
Sand a lot, and don’t skip grits if you want a smooth paint finish.

For paint, I used a satin cabinet enamel and sanded between coats with 400 grit. Might have been overkill, but it gave a nice smooth result.

Assembly & Finishing

Pocket holes went into the inner frame, following Kreg’s recommended spacing but later doubled up on each joint. Edge banding was done with a regular iron and trimmed with a flush cutter (don’t skip this tool).

I skipped filling the pocket holes—just in case I ever want to take it apart—and nailed a thin MDF backing to the rear. Conveniently, it left a ½” gap at the bottom… which is now a perfect spot for a hidden power strip.

Dog Stairs Build

These were designed specifically for the dogs (Mocha + guest pups) and built using:

Laser-cut ½” ply for the steps and side panels
2x4 framing
Corner braces for secure connections
Transparent anti-slip tape for grip

Everything was screwed into place with corner braces and painted to match the sideboard. And yes, I hit the stairs with edge banding too—because dogs deserve aesthetics.

Final Setup & Learnings

With the new, shorter tabletop installed on the desk and the sideboard slid into place, everything clicked together.

The desk can move up and down freely.
Mocha has a stable, comfy spot to window-watch.
We gained a ton of hidden storage.

Lessons I’ll take into future builds:

Always triple check for square before screwing things down.
MDF tears out a lot—use ply where possible.
Pocket holes are great… but maybe don’t be cheap on clamps.

Got questions? Want to see the next project in this office makeover series? Drop a comment below or subscribe to the YouTube channel so you don’t miss the upcoming desk setup transformation and more creative workspace builds.