Fold-out Couch to Queen Size Bed

There are a couple of different ways to include a couch in the build. The most popular that I’ve seen is a pull-out couch. Honestly, I wanted a couch that was easier to build, and more user-friendly. A lot of builders have trouble spacing the slats of the couch correctly, or just generally a rough time pulling out the couch to turn into a bed. This, of course, led to the inevitable YouTube rabbit hole, and eventually, we saw someone make a foldout couch. The answer to our YouTube

prayers. This was the first piece of furniture that we built on the bus, so I could definitely feel the pressure. Though when you think about it everything you will build for the bus is a glorified square or a fancy box. This simplicity makes building out the couch feel so much less daunting. To help with my own nerves I also drew out the dimensions for the folding-out piece of the couch. It ended up being an L shape, but this was the most nerve-racking part because if the size wasn’t right then it would lead to a multitude of problems. This also helped me visualize what I was building, and gave me an image to aim towards which was useful.

The first step to building the couch is of course deciding on the size. My couch folds out to almost a Queen size bed, but the folding piece of my couch is smaller because of the L that adds another two feet to the end, so if you’re going for a normal couch setup, take

this into consideration before using my dimensions. After deciding what size bed you’d like the couch to fold out to, cut the number in half. That’ll be the actual size of the pieces you stack on top of each other. Then use hinges on the ends to make it fold out. In my drawing, I have three hinges, but we ended up only needing two. You can add drawers to the front in order to use the space underneath the couch, but I dropped the original air conditioner from the ceiling to beneath the couch, and that took up most of the space. Nonetheless, on both sides of the couch, the bottom does open up so that I can use the space underneath the couch. Obviously, this isn’t the most accessible storage so I plan to keep the extra bedding or other items I don’t use every day underneath the couch.

The next part of the fold-out couch is building the legs/back of the couch. Typically, the back of a couch is on a 3-5 degree angle. So we used a protractor to measure a 5-degree angle, and then eyeballed the first triangular piece. It is however important that these are all the same angle/ height, and so after making the first piece, we cut a template the same size to use for the other pieces. We put a “leg” about every 4-6 inches and then covered it with thinner plywood. If you’re not sure what measurements to use, measure the couch you already have to get an idea of what you already know is comfortable. We have a reclining couch in the living room, which is part of the reason I decided to go with an L-shaped couch because I already knew that’s what I found comfortable.

These pictures show what the fold-out part of the couch looked like after it was done, and then after adding the “L”. On the L side of the couch, I put my 30-gallon water tank, and still had a 2’x4’ section for storage. Building your own couch gives you a lot of big storage options. Whether you use the couch to hide an air conditioner and water tank or to store fishing gear. No matter what you use it for having the space available can be crucial to your build. I just recently graduated college, and so moving into the bus actually gave me more space than I’ve ever had, which is hilarious when you think about it. But I know that most of the time this is not the case. In fact, many families are reevaluating their entire lifestyles to live tiny, and so it’s important that wherever you can put space, you do. Every extra square inch of storage you can create makes a difference. I say this in almost every blog, so at this point, I’m beating a dead horse, but I can’t stress enough how important this is.

But there are also some benefits to just transitioning the couch in your home onto the bus. It might be more comfortable, look nicer, and be cheaper than building your own. But to me, it was more important that my build be something long-term and have all the space I need to make it a sustainable choice. Also, after putting memory foam cushions

on the couch it was pretty comfortable. Clearly, I’m not a professional couch builder, but nonetheless, I’m proud of what I built, and personally, putting a “normal” couch in my bus wouldn’t have looked any better than the couch I built. To top it off, now I have a spare bed for when my friends or family come on adventures with me, and one of the things I valued when building was making sure that I had the capacity to bring people with me. This is what my couch looks like now that it’s complete as a couch and as a Queen size bed.

Enjoy the Sweet Life, and thanks for reading.

-Hannah