Building Your Own Standing Desk / Standing Workstation
You don’t have to be that smart to know if you have a sedentary job, and then at home spend an additional 15 – 20 hours a week on the couch with your laptop that it’s not great for your body. Posture, set bent angles of your body (and a laptop actually on you lap!). If it wasn’t for some sports playing a large part in my life I would be in trouble – but I knew it couldn’t continue as my body was sending messages back to flag it was time to change my behavior. Giving up the computer isn’t an option though. A recent trip to the Chiropractor sparked an interest in the standing workstation (which I’m working from now…at home). I was surprised by the lack on info out there on this concept. There are some cool niche products available mind you. I also wasn’t looking for a sitting / standing option that could change heights. I wanted a dedicated standing work station that looked good, and could sit in a place that a chunky desk with chair couldn’t. I’m also skeptical (having been working standing up for a few weeks now) that an all in one option would have significant compromises to work…
At home I had some 300mm square cubes floating around, so these became my ‘concept’ workstation to see how I could handle the time on my feet working. Surprisingly it wasn’t that hard, and in fact I felt good for it. It was also a novelty just being able to walk away to do stuff and walk back and start working again. This concept setup highlighted a few key points for me…
1. The setup was too high. I’m not sure what standard practice is but I felt this needed to be slightly lower than my elbows (when standing straight with arms bent).
2. I needed more surface space to sit my laptop, and phone and anything else.
3. I liked the shelving options (One shelf on the bottom, but if I spun it around I would have a shelf in the middle and top.
4. If I was to do this right, then I would need some small shelving to sit my laptop (if using wireless keyboard and mouse etc).
So after the one week concept I went down to the local Build Depot and spent $52.74 on 3 sheets of ‘hardypanel’ or customwood. These were 2400mm x 400mm and 18mm thick. I got them to cut these up into my required sizes…and I kept it simple. 2 x 1100mm for the sides (based on my height requirements), and 8 x 580mm for the shelving components (I made it 580mm to ensure I could get 4 per sheet…even if the guy cutting it was a few mm out). 
At home I had some old paint, and screws from previous DIY adventures, so the only additional cost was a pot of touch up paint which was less than $5.
At home I sanded the sheets, slightly beveled the edges (just by sanding them), and gave them an undercoat. I then put two top coats on each panel (sloppy paint brush, then roller finish for texture). 3 of the 580mm panels got painted in my test pot colour (orange / red ‘Havoc’).
After that I drilled, glued and screwed the panels together to get the end result. 
The size has worked out well, but there are a couple of steps to finish it off.
1. Get a monitor that can be wall mounted at eye height (the screen / keyboard proximity of a laptop requires looking down. A less permanent option would be to mount a stand up the back of the workstation that could hold the monitor – but it might not be deep enough to do this comfortably
2. Get a wireless keyboard and mouse, so the laptop can run closed in the top shelf.
All in all I’m glad I made the move. My body feels better for it, as does my conscience. Try it!