The Tallboy Holds Nearly as Much as a Chest 40cm Wider

Two pieces of bedroom furniture, one 140cm wide and one 100cm. One with six drawers, one with five. The wider one with more drawers holds more: that is the assumption almost everybody makes, and in this catalogue it is wrong four times out of five.

Cedora builds both to a fixed grid, which makes them unusually easy to compare. Every six drawer chest is 140 x 45 x 85cm. Every five drawer tallboy is 100cm wide and 45cm deep. Measure the drawers rather than the boxes and the gap between them almost disappears.

Key Takeaways

• Every chest is 140 x 45 x 85cm; every tallboy is 100cm wide and 45cm deep.
• Tallboy heights run from 100cm to 120cm depending on the range, a 20cm spread.
• In four of five ranges the two pieces hold within eight percent of each other.
• The tallboy takes 0.45 square metres of floor against 0.63 for the chest.
• What the extra 40cm of wall really buys is a usable surface at 85cm, not capacity.

Every Chest Is 140cm Wide and Every Tallboy Is 100cm

Five ranges make both pieces, and the outside dimensions do not vary at all on the chests. The London Pine 6 Drawer Chest, the Manchester Pine 6 Drawer Chest, the Bristol Pine 6 Drawer Chest, the Newcastle Acacia 6 Drawer Chest and the Liverpool Pine 6 Drawer Chest - Natural are all 140 x 45 x 85cm.

The tallboys hold width and depth at 100cm and 45cm but move on height. The Liverpool Pine 5 Drawer Tallboy - Natural stops at 100cm, the Bristol Pine 5 Drawer Tallboy reaches 110cm, the Newcastle Acacia 5 Drawer Tallboy and Manchester Pine 5 Drawer Tallboy both land on 114cm, and the London Pine 5 Drawer Tallboy goes to 120cm.

The number that never changes is 45cm of depth, and it is the one worth writing on your hand. In a bedroom, depth is what you lose from the walkway beside the bed, and 45cm out from the wall is the same loss whichever piece you buy. Everything else about this decision is a trade between wall and height.

Five Drawers That Are Not Five Equal Drawers

Every tallboy here uses the same layout: two narrow drawers side by side across the top, then three full width drawers below. It looks like a styling choice and it is not. A single wide drawer is where small items go to disappear, so the range splits the top row in two and gives you a compartment sized for the things you reach for daily.

The numbers vary a little by range. The Bristol runs top drawers at 42.5 x 37 x 20.8cm and lower drawers at 87.5cm wide. The London goes narrower and taller at 39cm across the top and 22.5cm deep inside, with 80.5cm lower drawers. The Newcastle has the widest lower drawers in the range at 87.6cm, and the shallowest at 18.5cm.

In use that split is what makes a tallboy work in a room where two people share one piece of furniture. The two small drawers become one each, and the three below hold the folded clothing that neither of you needs to see every morning. A chest cannot make that division because all six of its drawers are the same size.

London Pine 5 Drawer Tallboy

Six Drawers That Really Are Six Equal Drawers

The chests take the opposite approach: two columns of three identical drawers, 59cm to 63cm wide depending on the range, all the same size within a given piece. Nothing on a chest is sized for small items, and that is the design decision that shapes what it is good at.

Interior heights are where the ranges genuinely separate. The Liverpool Pine 6 Drawer Chest - Black and its natural twin run 24.6cm deep inside, the deepest drawer in the catalogue. The Manchester sits at 20.6cm, the Bristol at 20.3cm, the London at 19.1cm, and the Newcastle at 16cm, which is a full 8.6cm shallower than the Liverpool.

That range matters more than the drawer count. A 16cm drawer takes folded t-shirts and flattens anything thicker. A 24.6cm drawer takes a stack of jumpers without compressing the one on the bottom into a sheet. If you buy chests by looking at the outside, all five of these look identical, and inside they are not.

Liverpool Pine 6 Drawer Chest - Natural

The Capacity Gap Is Smaller Than the Width Gap

Multiply the internal dimensions out and the comparison becomes concrete. In the London range the tallboy holds roughly 275 litres against the chest at 259. In the Newcastle range it is 243 against 226. Both times the five drawer tallboy, on 40cm less wall, wins.

The other three go the other way by similar margins. Manchester is 260 litres for the tallboy against 270 for the chest, Bristol 267 against 282. Only Liverpool breaks the pattern properly, where those 24.6cm drawers give the chest about 344 litres against 282 for the tallboy, a genuine 22 percent gap.

So the honest summary is this: outside the Liverpool range, the number of drawers tells you nothing about capacity. The chest is 40 percent wider and holds within eight percent of the same volume, because the tallboy simply stacks the same drawer area upward instead of spreading it sideways.

London Pine 6 Drawer Chest

What the Extra 40cm of Wall Actually Buys

If it is not capacity, it is the top. A chest at 85cm puts a usable surface at hip height, which is the height a kitchen bench is built at for the same reason. That surface holds a lamp, a tray, a folded pile of washing waiting two days to be put away, and it is where the matching mirror goes.

A tallboy top at 110cm or 120cm is a different object. It is above the eye line of anyone sitting on the bed and just below the eye line of anyone standing, which makes it good for a plant and useless as a place to get ready. Nothing you put up there gets seen properly, and nothing you put up there is easy to reach.

There is a second cost to height, and it is a safety one. A loaded tallboy is top heavy, and a child who opens the lower drawers and climbs them can bring the whole piece down. Anchor anything over a metre to a wall stud or a rated plasterboard fixing, and do it on the day it arrives rather than the weekend after.

Newcastle Acacia 5 Drawer Tallboy

Which One the Room Picks for You

Start with the wall rather than the wardrobe. One clear run of 140cm with nothing crossing it, no door swing and no robe track, and the chest is the better buy every time: same storage, better surface, lower profile in a small room. That run is rarer in Australian bedrooms than people expect once the bed, the robe and the window are placed.

If what you actually have is a metre of wall in a corner, between a window and a door frame, the tallboy is not a compromise. It is the piece designed for that gap, and outside the Liverpool range it gives up almost nothing in return. Check the height against the window sill and the light switch before ordering, because the difference between the 100cm Liverpool and the 120cm London decides whether it passes under or blocks it.

The rooms that need both are the ones with two people and one wardrobe, and there the split is easy: the chest with its mirror takes the long wall and does the morning routine, and the tallboy takes the corner and swallows everything seasonal. Between the tallboy range and the chests, the room decides, not the drawer count.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does a tallboy hold less than a chest of drawers?

Barely. Measured drawer by drawer, four of the five Cedora ranges put the tallboy and the chest within eight percent of each other, and in the London and Newcastle ranges the five drawer tallboy actually holds more than the six drawer chest.

What are the standard dimensions of a tallboy and a chest?

Across this range every six drawer chest is 140cm wide, 45cm deep and 85cm high. Every five drawer tallboy is 100cm wide and 45cm deep, with heights from 100cm to 120cm depending on the range. Depth is the one number that never changes.

Why does a tallboy have two small drawers at the top?

Because a full width drawer is a bad home for small things. The two top drawers run 38cm to 43cm wide, which suits socks, underwear, belts and jewellery, while the three below run 80cm to 88cm wide for folded jumpers and denim.

Which is better for a small bedroom?

The tallboy, on floor space alone. It occupies 0.45 square metres against the chest at 0.63, which is 40 percent less floor for a similar amount of storage. The trade is that you lose the usable surface at hip height.

Do tallboys need to be anchored to the wall?

Yes. Anything over a metre tall with drawers that pull out is top heavy once the upper drawers are loaded, and a child climbing an open drawer can bring it over. Fix it to a stud or use a rated plasterboard anchor, particularly in a child's room.