Ideas for Converting a Piano

Furniture

• Remove the action and plate and turn it into a desk
• Remove the plate, action and keys and create a book shelf
• Cut it down, re-use the wood and build chairs
• Lay the sound-board horizontally and create a table. Build up dividers on the bridges to create dividers.
• Use the sides, bottom, lid, and back-posts to construct steps or a ladder
• Make sitting benches out of the sides and back-posts
• Using a sideboard or front board as the base, glue scroll work and reliefs in designs for wall art. Frame it in piano trim
• Remove the plate, install rubber casters and use the piano shell as a stage prop

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Art

• Entire piano
  • Place the piano in the yard and plant trees, flowers and bushes in and on it
  • Install a waterfall in or over the piano
• Piano parts
  • Make an artistic metal fence using piano plates
  • Braze iron plates together to make a large sculpture
  • Use pieces of plate for doorstops, paperweights, or counter-balances
  • Make a metal sculpture using piano pedals, V-bars, & other hardware
  • Carve the felt hammers into birds, animals and flower shapes
  • Make shapes out of action parts
  • Create structures and designs by gluing key sticks together
  • Do scrimshaw with old ivories
  • Remove key front rail and balance rail pins, and pound them into a design on a board the way people make nail designs.

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Construction

• Use music boards and knee boards for wainscoting on walls
• Make a fence out of piano parts or with lots of pianos
• Piece front boards, lids, side boards, knee boards and trim together to cover an entire wall.
• Build a door using the design sections of fancy music boards
• Use trim pieces to decorate shelving, walls, desks, or around doors and windows
• Use tuning pins as shelf supports

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