Spy Finds is a daily series that unveils the coolest, under-the-radar products that you haven’t heard of until now. Each product is curated by our editors who want to help you discover cool finds you didn’t know you needed.
Think of your humble coffee table for a moment. Holder of things, stalwart fixture of your living room furniture. But when you get right down to it, a simple creature. Things sit on it, often in ever-growing and unsightly stacks. Maybe it has a drawer or two, usually filled to the point of jamming with things that wouldn’t fit on the stacks.
Now think of a replacement for your humble coffee table. One that actually encourages organization, has pile-preventing storage, removable trays and all sorts of cool innovations. Think of a coffee table that can even be seamlessly connected to another coffee table. Congratulations: You’ve just thought of the Bento Coffee Table by Burrow.
The name is the tell here. The Bento Coffee Table is inspired by the Japanese food serving sets that keep your meal, well, organized. A place for this, a place for that, all neatly separated and easily accessible — that’s the bento-box concept, and it works fantastically when brought to this coffee table, which is much more than it appears at first glance.
The spacious built-in storage area is perfect for all of those things that usually sit atop your coffee table: remote controls, chargers, books, whatever. All that necessary clutter can now be neatly concealed and still easily accessed, while all you see is the attractive ash tabletop in walnut or oak finish.
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That tabletop is made of three removable, rearrangeable trays. If you’re a coffee-table eater, instead of hunching over your food while it sits on the tabletop, you can grab a tray and lean back on the couch. Same for your laptop if you’re getting some work done at the table. That’s right, the removable table tops can double as TV trays and lap desks.
The trays are also modular, so if you decide to put two Bento Coffee Tables next to each other, you can connect them into one large table. At 40″ x 20″ x 17″ one table is the perfect size for most living rooms, but if you need something larger to put in front of a big sectional seating area, two Bentos would do the trick, and also give you the flexibility to separate them later.
The Bento Coffee Table frame is made from solid ash hardwood, and the trays are made of quality MDF with an ash veneer. The legs are durable powder-coated steel with a retro hairpin design. And yet this coffee table is still remarkably easy to assemble, with no tools required. It’s also just as easy to take apart and reassemble if you need to move.
Burrow offers the Bento Coffee Table for $495, reasonable as a useful and well-built piece of modern furniture goes. Throw in the free one-week delivery Burrow guarantees with all of its items, and you suddenly have a serious incentive to buy a new coffee table. You could be enjoying a bento box lunch on your Bento Coffee Table — very meta!