DIY Scratching Post Desk Legs

Living with a cat has meant that I've always had a not so attractive scratching post around my apartment. Not only are they not pretty to look at, but they take up precious floor space too. So I came up with this idea to convert the legs of my inexpensive IKEA desk into built-in scratching posts. With these scratching post legs, there's no need to have stand alone scratching posts that take up floor space so they are perfect for small apartments and they make boring desk legs look a bit more interesting.

I built my IKEA desk with a GALANT top and ADILS legs ($3.50 each) and used 1" pre-slit pipe insulation, sisal rope (100 ft per leg) and foam double sided tape to convert the legs into a scratching posts. You can see the scratching post leg project and the rest of my IKEA desk hacks in the video but I'll explain the steps here as well.

Cut the pipe insulation to fit the length of the leg and wrap around the leg. I used pre-slit self sealing pipe insulation and stuck the edges of the insulation to the leg to prevent it from moving. You could also use insulation without the adhesive and use double sided tape secure it to the leg. By placing the gap on the inside of the desk, it's not noticeable. The insulation makes the legs closer in diameter to a scratching post you would buy at the store.

Step 2: Attach strips of double-sided foam tape around the top and bottom, and along the length of the insulation.

Wrap the sisal rope around the insulation, pulling tightly as you go along and wrap white tape at the bottom of the legs to secure the rope.

I love the natural color and texture that the sisal rope adds to my office and the legs have been a hit with my cat Lia. She does tend to use the front legs more than the back legs but the nice thing with the IKEA legs is that they are easy to take off to rotate the back legs to the front, so it will be a while before I have to replace the sisal rope.