We plan to build one also. There are some very easy ways to accomplish this depending on what you want the end result to look like.

By simply taking short uppper kitchen cabinets, building a base for them to raise them to your desired seating height and putting cushions on them, you can build a very nice seating area. If you go to HGTV and DIY web sites you can find variations on how to build different styles.

Kitchenkelly, a member of GW forum, has a very nice one. You might try searching for her name and see if you can find photo's of hers or else you could put a call out to her specifically on the decorating forum.

we are having one put it- our cabinet company (shiloh) actually makes a cabinet with big drawers that is the right height for a banquette seat, so we just ordered a few of those. It cost about $200 for each cabinet (we ordered 3). It is a great space saver!

my banquette is in a bay window with many angles so we're doing a combo of things. First we're using cabinets (drawers) built for us (Omega so everything is custom without an upcharge because they charge too much in the first place :oP) So, drawers, but then on the angles we're doing door face frames so the space beneeth is open. THen we cap this with a seat, and we're having our cabinet istaller (a wonderful carpenter) is building the back portion out of matched cherry again, because of all the odd angles. So it's a combo of cabinets, doors and slab cherry cut on site.

YOu can do something as simple as church pew style seating, which can be built on site or even cut down pews to fit a space (which is inexpensive but looks lovely) or build a fancy drawer you can store a body in (Kitchenkelly keeps her ex's in hers).

Igloo, I didn't want to mention KK's morgue drawers as I didn't want to scare the OP. LOL I keep that photo of her pups pulling the bodies out of the drawers ever fresh in my mind and that image is always there when I need to smile.

As said, they can be very simple and inexpensive. What are the ages and physical conditions of people who'll use it, though, and how do you want it used? Just for quick meals, mostly for young people, or lounging and chatting in too? If so, some investment in a bit of a slope to the back so people can relax into it would be good, recessing the panel one's heels bump against to allow people to shift their positions by sweeping their feet back for balance, and of course upholstery.

When I was considering whether to build a banquette--for the same reasons as you, I lucked into wandering into a charming restaurant in Key West that had banquette seating constructed in various sizes and types to fit the spaces available. It was before the lunch crowd piled in, so as I was able to try them all out and was happy to find they were all viable, even compared directly against each other. Even a vertical back with a quarter inch of upholstery stapled to the wall (nice for decoration mostly) was comfortable in the short term--I assume for about as long as it takes for one to really wish to be able to shift weight off the thighs farther back onto the bottom.

Hey, hey, hey! You two (you know who you are) knock it off. Don't be scaring off the new members.

we are also putting in a banquette....rosie has a good point. i think they are charming but i'm mostly planning on the small kids to pile in. we are having ours made by a carpenter because it was much cheaper than our cabinet co. also, do you want it painted or stained? we are painting our to match our painted cabinets but if it would have been stained, i might have paid more and went through our cabinets company.