Inflatable Air Bed

From an aesthetic standpoint, air beds are fit for temporary usage. But are they aesthetically fit as a permanent replacement for a traditional mattress? Most would agree that they’re not. However, many of us fail to realize that mattresses themselves aren’t that appealing in the first place. Take away their frame, and your left with two bland, white boxes. With this in mind, couldn’t we enhance the appearance of an air bed using a bed frame? You bet we could!

Most, if not all bed frames currently on the market can be adapted to suit the needs of an inflatable air bed. However, we will be focusing on adapting a platform bed frame for use with an air bed. When you’re shopping for the frame, be sure to get one that is appropriately sized for your bed (just as you would with a traditional mattress). Aside from sizing requirements, you’re free to choose a frame which appeals to your tastes.

Once you’ve purchased your bed frame, load into the car and drive down to your local home improvement store. Park you car and proceed to open your frame’s box. Among its many contents, you should find a pair of wooden slats. We need to get the dimensions of one of these slats so that we can cut two pieces of plywood to sit atop the pair. If you don’t have a measuring tape handy, we recommend looking for the frame’s assembly instructions. They should specify the dimensions of the slats.

When you have the dimensions in hand, walk into the home improvement store head to the lumber isle. Browse though their selection of plywood sheets and find one than can be cut into two identical pieces (with our required dimensions). Now we arrive at a crossroads. You can either choose to allow the store to cut the sheet, or you can take it home and cut it yourself. We recommend allowing the store to do it, considering that many do it free of charge.

Now that you have all the materials you need, head home and begin assembling the bed frame. For now, don’t worry about the plywood sheets – just assemble the bed frame according to the included instructions. Once the assembly phase is complete, retrieve the plywood sheets and place one atop each set of wooden slats. These sheets are what will allow you to place your inflatable air bed within the frame.

Before moving your air bed into its new frame, you need to cover the plywood sheets with some sort of material. Their course exterior and tendency to splinter will pose a danger to the bed. Thus, we recommend layering the plywood with a thick blanket or a sheet of rubber. Finally, you can set your air bed within its frame and begin to enjoy your new sleeping setup!

We hope that you are no longer discouraged to explore the benefits of inflatable air beds just because they can be an aesthetic nuisance. As we’ve demonstrated above, one of their most significant downfalls can be remedied with a bit of ingenuity.

Image Courtesy: Rick Audet