This came wrapped nicely in a thick box with padding. You just unfold, watch for keyboard slipping out and reinsert it later. You just slip the top of desk into one wooden dowel on each side so it keeps in place. The desk is more sturdy for a folding one due to the x-bars on the side. The keyboard tray is 26" high, which is good for me, a shorter person. As for the color, I hesitated because the 2 brown colors were hard to tell exactly what they were because some of the pictures were a bit brighter. I got the warm brown, but am not sure it isn't the expresso. It looks like a walnut with darker brown stripes in the wood grain, so it would match more items with that variation in color. However, if this is the warm brown, the expresso must be really dark, almost blackish by comparison. This desk does match a walnut brown chest that I have next to it that is antiqued on top with the darker stripes from the paint brush. The wide keyboard is what I needed for my wide ergonomic keyboard and mouse. It is just not worth buying those desks where the keyboard width is questionable because I have had 2 of them and it never worked out. I think this will be my final desk and I might order another one to make an L-shape or put beside this one, as the price was nice too. Hope this helps.