If you love an industrial look, or are simply trying to bring a modern element into your home, making custom pipe furniture and home accessories are a great way to do that! Here are a ton of DIY pipe furniture ideas for your home!

What’s up with pipes being used in furniture? Pipes are an industrial material and have often been used in place of metal for things like furniture legs.

A great thing about using piping for DIY furniture is that it’s more accessible than traditional metal. Pipe pieces screw together, meaning no welding is necessary.

So, piping is a really beginner – DIYer way to incorporate metal accents into your home.

Now, let’s talk about different types of pipes.

Black iron pipe furniture

Black iron is the most common type of piping used in modern, industrial furniture. It is black in color, though there are often silver pieces, too.

Beware – a lot of the pieces sold at the hardware store have colored writing printed on them. Because of this, we usually plan to spray paint our pipes a matte black once they are assembled. Here’s the best black spray paint!

This is an optional step, but I think that it gives it a better final result.

Also know that iron piping comes in a lit of different widths. It can get kind of expensive if you need a lot of pieces – so moving to a smaller width is a good way to save money.

Just be sure that whatever you select is sturdy enough to support the weight of your project. If you are building a bench or chair, it needs to be able to support the people that will sit on it, too.

Cleaning black iron pipe for furniture

The black iron pipes that you buy at the hardware store are most likely going to be greasy. This is a coating to help prevent corrosion. Since your pipes aren’t going to hold water, they don’t need the coating.

Mineral spirits or acetone on a rag will remove the grease from your pipes.

PVC pipe furniture

Another great option for pipe furniture is PVC pipe. PVC pipe is made from plastic. That makes them cheaper than iron pipes.

However, they are always going to look like plastic. You can paint them – spray paint in a metal color with a hammered finish even – but it will always look like plastic and be lightweight compared to metal.

Outdoor pipe furniture

When PVC pipe furniture really shines is outdoors. Because it’s made of plastic, it won’t get rusty. So, this is a great option for building DIY outdoor furniture.

Copper pipe furniture

Another cool option for piping is to use copper pipes. Copper pipes are really beautiful and a shiny pinkish gold (copper, haha) color.

Copper pipe is great for home accessories and is easy to cut with a hand tool. However, it can be pretty thin and might not be great for any project that needs to hold a lot of weight.

Where to buy pipe for furniture

The best place to buy piping to use to build furniture is at your local hardware store. Lowes and Home Depot both carry a wide selection.

One reason that I prefer to buy my piping in person is because I like to physically screw the pieces together in the aisle to be sure that I have all of the right connectors!

It can be kind of confusing and the “specialists” in those aisles usually know plumbing and look at you like you are nuts if you tell them you are making a bench.

Take your time and when in doubt, over buy and return extra pieces.

DIY Pipe Furniture Ideas

I have pulled together a ton of different pipe furniture ideas from my friends all over the internet. I hope that this list inspires you to get building!