TV units, shoe cabinets and tables: the small jobs

A TV unit is a fifth of the board of a wardrobe and is often quoted at half the price. Here is what is actually in one.

The small pieces of built-in furniture — TV unit, shoe cabinet, dressing table, study table, computer table — are where quotations are least disciplined. They are too small for anyone to bother itemising and too varied for a per-square-foot rate to mean anything, so they tend to arrive as a round number. They are also the easiest things in a house to cost properly, because there is so little in them.

TV unit cost: what the object contains

A typical wall-hung TV unit design is a shallow box, one or two drawers, a back panel with cable cut-outs, and either a floating bracket or a plinth. That is perhaps eight board parts, six metres of edge banding, a pair of drawer channels and the wall fixings. It is a small object and it should be priced like one.

• Depth 350–450 mm. Deeper and it dominates the room; shallower and a set-top box will not sit in it.
• Height off the floor. Screen centre wants to be at seated eye level, about 1000–1100 mm. Work backwards from that, not from the unit.
• Cable management is a real part. Cut-outs, a wire casing run and a socket position. Left out of the design, it becomes visible forever.
• Floating vs plinth. Floating looks better and needs a wall that will actually carry it. A plinth is cheaper and forgiving.

Shoe cabinet

The one piece of furniture where ventilation is a functional requirement rather than a preference, and it is almost always omitted. A closed shoe cabinet with no air path is a smell generator. Perforate the back or the plinth, keep the shelves tilted about ten degrees so shoes sit heel-down, and allow 150 mm of height per shelf for ordinary shoes and 200 mm for boots. Depth 300–350 mm if the shelves are tilted, 400 mm if flat.

Dressing table

The mirror and the lighting are the design; the carcass is trivial. Light the face from both sides at face height rather than from above — an overhead light casts exactly the shadows you are trying to see past. Drawer depth of 100–120 mm is right for cosmetics; deeper drawers become a place things are lost.

Study table and computer table

Two numbers matter and both are ergonomic, not stylistic: the worktop at 720–750 mm, and at least 600 mm of clear knee depth with nothing crossing it. A stretcher rail at shin height ruins an otherwise good study table. For a computer table add a cable route from the desk rear to the floor, and decide where the tower actually goes before rather than after.

Each of these is its own object type in the configurator, with its own parts, its own quantities and its own line on the bill of quantities — the same store, tree, cutting list and quotation as the cupboard, with no special cases. Open the design tool.