I am no handy woman by any means, but I promise it took me only 5 whole minutes, from the moment I took the pieces out of the packaging to finally assembling the table.  I honestly believe it took me longer to get the box undone than the assembly.  It looks as though the top of the table is a mahogany color in the pictures, but it is actually a brown hue with no reddish tint at all.  It serves the purpose of what I needed it for (hold a decorative plate/charger), but nothing else.