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Ever wondered what it would be like to have your own mini rave in your living room? Well, Piers Helm did just that. Recently, he turned a boring old IKEA coffee table into a tiny, neon-lit dance floor complete with a DJ, clubbers, and even a smoke machine. It’s like a mini-festival in a box, and it’s totally mind-blowing.
Check out the video below for Piers’ mini rave in a table.
“Hey Piers, what made you want to put a rave scene in a coffee table?” I asked, intrigued when I saw the initial photos of the IKEA hack.
His answer was not one I expected.
A £1 Table And A Music Festival
The journey began rather unassumingly when Piers acquired the RAMVIK coffee table for just £1 on eBay. A seasoned designer and creator of 3D and 2D animations for television, Piers saw beyond the regular IKEA coffee table. It was a canvas for something cool—a tiny world under the glass of the table.
Interestingly, this is not Piers’ first attempt at hacking a RAMVIK table. About 15 years ago, he made a random scene using old computer stuff, toy soldiers, model houses, and even valves from a 1950s TV—whatever he had lying around. Initially, he intended to do the same with the second RAMVIK, and then …
Plot twist …
“I went to the Noisily Festival of Music and Arts,” he shares. “Bought the ticket on a whim while drunk at 2.30 am with a girl I had only just met. The last festival I went to was the Stonehenge Festival in 1984. Forty years ago! In the time between I had been married to someone who didn’t like festivals, and recently had a very acrimonious divorce from.”
The Noisily Festival blew my mind, partly as I am a fan of house and techno music, but more so having gone through horrible times with the divorce, it signified me having come out the other side and doing things I enjoy again.”
Coffee Table Hack For Mini Rave
Pier’s first step was removing the drawers on the coffee table and fixing the ends to create a large space inside the table. Using a jigsaw, he cut a large rectangular opening in the top, setting the stage for the scene he was about to create.
3D Printed Assets
Leveraging his skills in 3D modeling, Piers designed assets for the scene instead of relying on random found objects. He created and printed them using a Bambulab 3D printer. These assets included a DJ and DJ booth, Funktion One speaker stacks, clubbers, and even trees, all of which were glued in place using a hot glue gun and then sprayed a mid-grey color.
See process photos in the slideshow below:
Laser And Smoke
To bring the scene to life, Helm fitted an inexpensive laser party light and a mini smoke machine inside the table. He then replaced the original glass top with thicker, toughened glass, ensuring the diorama was both durable and visually striking.
Nosily All Over Again
“I had been playing with an arrangement of toy soldiers around a plasma ball as a kind of rave,” he explains, “So it seemed a natural progression to make a rave scene based on Noisily to remind myself of it. There is a couple in the middle of the table: myself and the girl I went to the festival with. She has become one of my closest friends.”
The rave scene within the RAMVIK table, on display in his living room, is a pulsating reminder of his journey back to joy and creativity.
Project Cost and Time
This project took about two weeks and cost around £150 ($197). It turned out exactly as Piers imagined. If he could do it again, the only thing he’d change is to film the process.
Piers Helm’s rave party table is more than just a cool IKEA hack. He used technology and his skills to create something amazing and tangible, as a way to help him own his story.
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