I recently posted a table that I built for the wife... She liked it so much she wanted a new bench and chairs to go with it - thus far I have completed the bench, and am moving onto the chairs next.
I actually had an old bench design that I had come up with that we really liked for the most part. That design was really best suited for outdoor picnic tables etc. because it was made of dimensional lumber.. fast to build, cheap, sturdy as can be, and comfortable. I've made at least 10 of them for our own use, and friends/neighbors have made countless more. Here's that original bench next to the outdoor ping pong table I built a few years back.
original bench design.jpg
So, for the new bench, I decided to pay tribute to that original design, but upgrade to furniture joinery, and do a bit of refinement. I blended the joints, added some curves, contoured the back rest. In a separate thread, the guys here helped me figure out a stretcher approach that would be fairly well-hidden while also providing a lot of lateral stability.
Poplar with danish oil and poly top coat.
dining bench 6.jpg dining bench 7.jpg dining bench 8.jpg
The wife is really happy now (but still wants the chairs).