The bench itself has been fairly sturdy and looks nice with the rest of the decor. I love that it has adjustable shelves! It holds quite a few shoes and sandals...bonus! My main issue with this is the instructions and tools provided. There's not much to the instructions but you can kinda follow the pictures, but one picture is wrong and I put a piece in backwards. I even went back to the instructions to see if I missed it, but the number of holes is wrong for the direction the board needs to go. I had to undo 8 screws, which is difficult with the space, and the hex screw wouldn't go all the way around. The space at the top of the screw to put the hex in isn't deep enough, so I kept dropping it and accidentally flinging it across the room. I've put quite a few items together around our house and have not had so much difficulty with the hex as I did with this. Once it's all together, life gets easier.