My oldest son just went back to college to start his junior year. He was very excited to be moving back into the same apartment he shared with three friends last year. As he walked out the door, he said, "Hey dad, do you think you can build a bunkbed for me and my roommate?". Of course, my first thought was, "Why didn't you ask me this two months ago?", but like any supporting dad, I said "Sure I can!" . After all, I have access to some pretty amazing software to design it, and a collection of tools to build it.
I immediately looked up the dimensions of a twin mattress (38" x 75"), as well as comfortable heights for upper and lower bunk mattress elevations (assuming an  8' ceiling), then started modeling. I had a general recollection of his bedroom layout from last year, but I would need some critical dimensions to ensure the design was sound before I could cut the parts. 

...oh, did I mention that I needed to deliver a finished product the very next weekend? :)

Here's the actual timetable with which I was working.

• Monday: Max asks for a bunkbed and goes back to campus
• Tuesday night: Max calls and sends photo of hand sketch and measurements
• Wednesday night: Final tweaks to design and purchase materials
• Thursday night: Fabrication
• Friday morning: Drive to campus

My initial design was compact, with tapered legs in the front. It looked like this:Once I received Max's measurements, though, I learned that the lower mattress would cover a floor vent, so the mattress would have to be pulled out away from the wall 9". I considered making the whole bunk longer so the mattress would clear the tapered legs, but instead opted to push the lower portion of the legs to the outside. This made for an unconventional shape, but one the I felt still matched the overall 'mountain' aesthetic that I was going for.
Since I was short on time, I opted for a plywood construction that I could bang out on the CNC. It took three sheets in total.

T​​​​here was a fair amount of post processing to do to remove the tabs that held the pieces in place on the CNC, and then to round over all the edges with an 1/8" round-over bit. I was very glad to have my wife to help with this step.I used both mortise and tenon joints, as well as oversized finger joints, both of which were held in place with a bolt through a hole in one piece, and a washer and nut captured in a T-slot in the mating piece.
I got creative, and used material from the negative spaces in the plywood to thicken up the foot holds on the 'ladder' wall, as well as build a shelf on the opposite wall.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​