Pladur headboards: niches, light and sockets
In Spain the word pladur means plasterboard, and a pladur headboard is where the light, the sockets and the bedside storage end up — with no cables on the floor.
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Short answer
What is a pladur headboard and what does it solve?
A pladur headboard is a plasterboard panel built on a metal frame across the bed wall, usually 7–12 cm deep. That depth is exactly what makes it useful: it houses niches that replace bedside tables, a concealed LED profile, and the full electrical run — sockets, USB outlets and two-way switches on both sides of the bed. It is built during a renovation in two or three days of coordinated work between the plasterboard fitter and the electrician, and each new electrical point costs around €30–60 while the installation is already open. Adding the same wiring to a finished, painted bedroom means chasing walls and repainting the room corner to corner.
Pladur is technically a brand name that Spain uses for all drywall, the way hoover once meant any vacuum cleaner. If your builder says pladur, they mean plasterboard on a metal frame.
Variants
What can be built and when each option earns its place
| Variant | What it adds | When it is the right call |
|---|---|---|
| Flat half-height panel | Defines the bed zone; takes a different colour or texture | Small bedrooms where you cannot spare centimetres |
| Panel with side niches | Replaces bedside tables: book, phone, glasses, lamp | Narrow rooms with no side clearance, or a floor kept clear |
| Panel with top LED cove | Washes wall or ceiling with glare-free ambient light | Rooms with ceiling height to hide the profile |
| Full-height panel | Integrates light, niches, sockets, sometimes a wardrobe | Full renovations where the layout is being rethought |
| Panel with a running shelf | A continuous ledge side to side, cheaper than niches | Tight budgets and beds of 150 cm or wider |
Niches instead of bedside tables
The most practical variant in narrow bedrooms, where furniture eats the walkway beside the bed. A niche of 25–30 cm depth already holds a standing book, a charging phone and a glass of water — and the floor on both sides stays clear.
Indirect light done properly
The LED strip hides in a cove or along the panel edge, aimed at the ceiling or the wall, never at the bed. You want warm light, 2,700–3,000 K, and a dimmer — the light that works for reading is far too much at midnight.
Spanish specifics
Why Spanish bedrooms need one more than most
One socket per room
Flats wired decades ago often give each bedroom a single socket, placed wherever was convenient at the time. The headboard concentrates modern wiring exactly where it gets used — two sockets and a USB per side — without rewiring the flat or touching the rest of the room.
Chasing an old wall repaints the room
Many period walls are solid brick finished with old tempera-based paint, and a chased groove never patches invisibly: the fix is repainting corner to corner. Inside a headboard, the cable runs through the new metal frame — the original wall is never opened.
The party wall
When the bed stands against the medianera — the shared wall with the neighbouring flat — the headboard doubles as the cheapest acoustic lining you can buy: mineral wool inside the frame, a board in front. The neighbour’s television gets noticeably quieter.
Tall ceilings and cornices
Under a three-metre ceiling with plaster mouldings, a full-height panel fights the cornice and usually loses. A half-height or two-metre version respects the moulding and costs less — the panel’s height is decided by looking up, not at a catalogue.
Installations
What goes inside the panel
This is the part you appreciate most over time and the one impossible to add later without opening the panel. Everything is defined at the same moment the bed position is decided.
The usual contents
- Two sockets per side, in or next to the niche, for lamp and charger
- A USB outlet built into the socket plate, so no adapter lives there permanently
- A two-way switch on each side to kill the main light from the bed
- A dimmer for the LED strip, from reading light down to a nightlight glow
- A concealed cable route to the TV position, if one is planned
Height matters
Mechanisms go at mattress height plus a few centimetres: reachable with an outstretched arm from the bed, invisible from the doorway. A badly placed socket ends up replaced by an extension lead on the floor — exactly what the headboard was meant to remove.
Remote owners
Deciding from abroad
Decisions have a closing date
The panel closes once. Socket count, switch positions, the TV reinforcement, the LED dimmer — all fixed before the boards go on. Managed remotely, this is one of the few renovation items where a late idea genuinely cannot be accommodated.
The photo that matters
Ask for photographs of the open frame — cable runs and reinforcements — taken just before the boards close. That image is the only map of where you can and cannot drill in five years’ time, and it costs thirty seconds.
The spec worth sending in writing
- LED strip at 2,700–3,000 K with a dimmer, and an access hatch for the driver
- Sockets and USB per side, with heights measured from the finished floor
- Reinforcement position and rating if a TV or loaded shelf is planned
- The mattress height the whole geometry is based on
Frequently asked
Common questions
It is a Spanish brand name for plasterboard that became the generic word, like hoover for vacuum cleaners. A pladur headboard is a drywall panel on a metal frame built across the bed wall, with wiring, niches and lighting inside.
Usually 7–12 cm, depending on whether it is a flat panel or carries niches and electrics inside. That depth is what makes it worthwhile — much shallower and you lose most of the advantage over a bought headboard.
Yes, if a reinforcement is fixed inside the frame before the panel is closed, at the exact bracket position. Without it, the fixing relies on the board alone, which is not adequate for that weight.
A flat panel with no electrics, yes. Once there is light, sockets or switches involved, doing it during the works is far better: the cabling joins the rest of the installation instead of forcing chases and a full repaint — and in old walls with tempera paint, patches never blend in.
If the bed is against the shared wall, yes: mineral wool inside the frame plus the board acts as a small acoustic lining. It will not fix structural noise, but television and conversation from next door drop noticeably.
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