Dressing table

image of Ikea Malm dressing table
Ikea Malm dressing table in birch color, 120 cm (47.5 in) width

I was lucky to find a used Ikea Malm dressing table in birch color, which is no longer sold (at stores in my area and on the Ikea USA website). The only available version is white which would look horrendous in my studio since everything else is natural wood color.

Apparently I’m not the only person who fell in love with this model dressing table, as indicated by this other blog post at misschievous.tv in which the author describes it as “…the infamous MALM vanity from IKEA by now that I, and many other makeup enthusiasts, own.”

Her article mentions that there apparently was an original version of the Malm dressing table which measured 191 cm (75 inches) in width, whereas the one I was lucky to find is 120 cm (47.5 inches). This 47 inch model is wide enough. I can’t imagine having the room for a 75 inch model unless I had a mansion.

One thing that was amazing about this piece of furniture: In typical Ikea fashion it was very simple to disassemble, fit into my small car, and resassamble.

The material is some kind of pressed laminated type of board with synthetic birch-effect veneer over particleboard. A far cry from the natural stuff I typically propound here. In fact if this thing were trimmed down a bit it would be nice. It doesn’t need to be so hefty. Yet the heftiness of it imparts a certain plush, very solid quality to it. Still, I bet it could be a lot lighter and still very good, although it would not have the same level of solidity.

Anyhow it is a used piece of furniture that was taken care of very well and will continue to be taken care of very well. Now I just need to rearrange half my apartment to put it in place…