Desk Frames

A frame is the right purchase in exactly two situations, and the wrong one in every other. The first is that you already own a desktop you like: a solid door, a butcher block, a slab from a joiner, or the top off a desk whose legs gave up. The second is that you want a top wider, deeper or thicker than anything sold assembled. These frames span 44 to 90 inches, which is wider than every assembled desk in the catalogue.

The choice inside the section is motors, and it is genuinely a choice rather than a tier. Three single-motor frames carry 176 pounds and cost less; two dual-motor frames carry 264 pounds, lift faster and hold a wider top steadier at full height. The number that decides it is the weight of your top. A 71 by 30 inch slab of solid oak is around 90 pounds before anything is put on it, and at that point the single-motor rating is being spent on furniture rather than equipment.

What none of them include is a desktop, mounting hardware for an unusual top, or a way to know in advance where your existing top wants its bolts. The frames take standard through-bolts into a flat underside, so a hollow-core door or a top with a routed cable channel in the wrong place will need thinking about first. Nothing here is difficult; it is just the part people skip and then discover on a Saturday afternoon.