Someday we plan to get carpet again for our upstairs bedrooms, hallway, and stairs. For now, however, we have a cat. If you’ve been following along for a while, you’ve seen at least a few projects of mine that came about out of necessity because we needed to get rid of old flooring. I will say, the cat has forced me to get creative. 😜
Around two years, ago, I pulled the carpet off our stairs because of 1) cat and 2) it was 22 years old and consequently quite gross even without the cat’s help. My temporary fix at the time was to paint the stairs white to match the trim work, but obviously white stairs were doomed to fail too. So, this week, I finally got around to making wood-colored treads to hide dirt, crumbs, dog hair, etc.
BEFORE: Gross old carpet.
If you live in a house built in the 90s, you should probably be prepared to not find real, nice wood treads and risers when pulling up carpet. Instead, my treads were like a porous, MDF kind of wood. Also, there was a gap on either end of the stair pieces because of how they left room for the house to settle – my gaps were huge! Like many things I’ve found in our house, the original builders did not have future remodeling in mind when they did what they did.
Anyway, because we do plan someday to put carpet back on the stairs, I didn’t want to shell out $30-80 per stair for real wood stair treads. I could’ve salvaged the existing risers and just put trim on the ends to cover those gaps, but even just buying wood to make my own treads without risers, that was a lot of $$$.
I have gotten weirdly good at making non-wooden things look like real wood, so I decided to give it a go with paint and stain I already had.
My cost for this final part of my stair fix was $0, but even counting the earlier supplies I’d needed 2 years ago, it was still under $200 for this whole stair makeover. That would have been the same amount as about 4-5 stairs if I’d bought treads. I have 14 stairs.
Supplies:
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Step 1: Remove carpet from stairs. This was gross and not fun, I won’t lie. But once I tore it all off and got all the little staples out, it immediately felt worth it. (No pictures of this step because it was a lot of my butt on camera. LOL.)
Step 2: Cover any landings. If you have a landing or two, you’ll want to cover them so it’s not just the rough subfloor. Our staircase has 2 landings, so I covered these with 1/8 inch plywood in a herringbone pattern like I’d done to our upstairs hallway floor. (So, if you need to know how to do herringbone, see that post “DIY Herringbone Floor in a Hallway.”) You could do just one big piece of plywood if you don’t want to bother with the herringbone, but I really like how they turned out.
For the stair-side of the landing, I used outside corner guard molding to cover the edge. I was initially worried about the slight lip this would create, but it turned out not to be an issue. To cover the other sides around my landing where there was existing trim work, I used InstaTrim to cover the edges. But, as I’ll explain below, hold off on the InstaTrim until you’re done painting and staining!
Step 3: InstaTrim. Again, do this step last! But since I’d pulled my carpet 2 years ago, I’d done this step already and so had to work with the InstaTrim already on – hence, you’ll see it in all the pictures. So, I might as well explain how I did it here.
My biggest problem was figuring out how to cover the gaps on the ends of my stairs, because they were not equally spaced and way too wide for any kind of caulk solution. The risers could’ve used normal quarter-round trim, but the treads had curved fronts where ordinary trim wouldn’t have worked. So, I found InstaTrim at a size that would cover the widest areas of my gaps.
Starting at the top of my stairs, I went down one side and then the other, sticking the InstaTrim all along the ends of the risers, across the ends of the treads, over the curved lips of the treads, and down onto the next riser again. It sticks on fairly well with its own adhesive, but I did add a few little nails here and there under the tread fronts to help hold the trim in place. I also had to start a new strip at one point, so I nailed those ends too.
InstaTrim covering gaps.
For a few of the absolutely enormous gaps, I also filled in along the InstaTrim with a bit of paintable caulk.
Once that was on, my end gaps were covered!
The InstaTrim is paintable, which was fortunate for me since mine was already down and I’d need to do touchups once I was done painting the treads and the landings. 🤦♀️ BUT if you wait to add this trim last, that would be way, way easier!!
Step 4: Paint the landings and treads and risers with non-skid paint. Because my stairs were made from very basic materials, I needed to prime the “wood” to make sure knots and other discolorations didn’t show through. I also wanted to make sure the stairs weren’t too slippery when painted. To solve this problem, I used a non-skid paint intended for stairs. It had a gritty texture to it which helped give the stairs a base layer that wasn’t slippery.
If you’ll need to use these stairs while you’re doing this project, it’s a good idea to do every other stair as you work from the top down. That way, you still have every other stair to use while the first set dries. Once those are dry and you can stand/sit on them again, you can go back up and paint the stairs you skipped.
Painting the stairs with this gritty paint was as far as I got two years ago. You can see from my picture below why I needed to do something other than just this white! 🤦♀️ So, I finally got onto the next step this week!
White with 2 years of wear.
Step 5: Paint a base, light brown. Like the step above, you may want to paint every other stair at a time if you need to use them while they dry. I fortunately had shipped my kids off to their Grammy’s for a few days, so I didn’t have anyone using the stairs all day. This meant that I could simply start at the top and do all of my stairs and landings as I painted my way down.
I originally thought I would make both the risers and treads look stained like wood, so I painted both in a light brown color. However, I ended up painting the risers white to lighten up the stairwell again (and it looked better with the trim work of the stairwell). If you KNOW you want your risers white, simply paint those white now instead of brown. Just be sure to use a fine brush to create a straight line where the risers and treads meet at the back of each stair. And if you’re doing white, be sure to paint in good lighting and do at least 2 coats.
For the treads and landings, I applied just one simple coat of the light brown. It doesn’t have to be perfect since the stain will cover and add “character” anyway to cover paint streaks or areas not covered as well.
Brown base painted on.
I let this dry for several hours. You want to make sure the brown paint adheres really well so it doesn’t wipe off with the next steps.
Step 6: Stain over the paint. I thought I’d use a silicone basting brush like I’d done before when making faux-wood beams and my faux-wood light fixture, but that would have taken forever. I decided instead to try just dipping gloved fingers into the stain and wiping it on with my hands, and that actually worked really well! You don’t want to do it too thick, just enough to add a kind of wood grain look over the light brown. It was also nice to use my fingers because I could get right up along the edges. (Yes, too close to the edges, but I knew I’d have to touch up and paint the risers white anyway. You could tape things off for cleaner lines.)
Stain on.
I suppose you could use a brush, but it really helps the “wood” to look natural if you can rub the stain on with your hand. A brush can look too uniform with strokes. Plus, it’s important that the stain gets rubbed into the paint to help it set. I also found that I could make nice, long wipes across the entire length of the treads to make it look like one, natural board of wood without broken up strokes.
I also made sure to wipe the stain around the curve of the tread fronts. I really rubbed it in here to cover the porous texture of the MDF.
Staining curved fronts.
For this staining step, I would definitely recommend doing every other stair if you’ll need your stairs. If you need to step on your landings, leave those until later as well. Long story short, I tried to do it all in one go like I’d done with the brown paint, but the stain needs a LONG time to dry.
If you’re staining the risers as well as the treads, you’ll want to do that as you stain every other stair as well – really, you could stain all the risers as you go, since you won’t be stepping on them while they dry anyway. The stain REALLY ends up covering imperfections like dents, staple holes, etc., so it would look very nice to do both the treads and the stairs. However, for my stairwell, it would have made everything too dark, so again that’s why I ended up painting my risers white.
Step 7: Wipe off excess stain. Once every other stair’s stain has been on for about 6-8 hours, you might be concerned if it hasn’t dried and is still sticky. No worries! Because you were smarter than me and did every other stair, you can take a rag to the top stained tread and wipe off as much extra/wet stain as you can. This actually helps it look even more like natural wood! Work your way down the stairs – standing on the unstained stairs – and wipe each tread and/or riser until you like the look of them.
Stained wiped to dry.
Step 8: Add a coat of polyurethane. You can do this immediately after the above step. I used a brush and took a quart of clear gloss polyurethane to my top tread. Easily and quickly, I brushed a good coat of poly over the stained tread. If you stained your risers, give them a coat of poly too. Work your way all the way down to the bottom stained stair, then let it dry for an hour or two – mine dried really fast.
It would seem that the polyurethane might make the stairs slippery, but the stain and that non-skid paint on the base layer add a lot of texture. In the end, all of this makes the stairs feel more like real wood, too.
Step 9: Finish every other stair and landings. Once the poly is dry, you can now step on these finished treads and go back to stain the treads and landings that you skipped before. So, repeat steps 6-8 for these treads and also any landings. When staining the landings, make sure to wipe one herringbone board at a time to keep them looking like their own pieces of wood. If you do one big board for your landings, just keep the strokes going all in one direction.
Herringbone stained.
Step 10: Touchups. Like I said, I changed my mind and painted my risers white once I had my treads and landings done. Obviously it would have been less work to paint them white before staining. BUT I also liked that I didn’t have to be too careful when staining along the back of my treads, since I knew I could make a nice clean line with my white paint in the end (I don’t always trust tape to give me good lines).
I also had to repaint my InstaTrim, but you should be able to spare yourself that. However, if you make goofs or change your mind about your risers as you go, know that it’s not too late to make fixes! One of the nice things about touching up once the poly is on is that paint wipes off of dried polyurethane pretty nicely with a wet wipe or damp cloth!
Step 11: InstaTrim. Like I said, it would be smart to save this step for last. This way, you don’t get any of your paint or stain on it! (See step 3 for how to attach it.) I will say that, for my landings, the InstaTrim was much easier to put on because I was only dealing with straight lines and no curves like with the treads.
Now my stairs are finally done! This was actually easier than I thought it would be…and should be even easier for you if you follow my instructions rather than guess as you go like I did. 😆
AFTER: Clean, fake hardwood stairs!
Done!
It’s been a few days now with my girls and dogs and husband using the stairs, and I’m happy to report they hide dirt and hair WAY better than my white stairs. Go figure. LOL.
Today in my workshop/craft room, I found 2 posters rolled in a tube that I’d completely forgotten about! Did I have any frames lying around? No. 😜 But since I’m in a Spring mood and want to change up our decor a bit, I decided I wanted to hang one of these on the blank wall of our basement stairwell. But what to do for a frame?
BEFORE: Blank wall…
I did not want anything heavy. Certain little people like to jump down the stairs to the top landing, and the wall regularly gets slammed. A heavy frame (lord forbid with glass) would be an accident waiting to happen. Really, I didn’t even want anything that would hang normally because the inevitable body slams would most likely knock anything loose. Plus, I’m pretty sure there’s an air duct behind that wall, so nails wouldn’t even really support a hanging frame.
I really, really didn’t want one of those plastic poster frames that works great in a college apartment and/or bachelor pad.
I also wanted to spend $0.
Since I had a bunch of “ugly” scrap 1x2s that were 8-ft long and at least straight, I figured I could make a rustic wooden frame and hang the poster using command strips, then use command strips for the frame over that.
BEFORE: Scruffy 1x2s.
I’ve done something kind of similar in the past where I attached a wallpaper mural directly onto the wall and then nailed decorative 1x2s onto the wall to act as a frame. I LOVE how that works, but this time I wanted something a little more flexible where I could change the poster easily if I wanted without dismantling the frame. My new way would also mean zero damage to the wall.
Supplies:
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Step 1: Measure and cut wood frame pieces. My posters were 24×36. I decided to measure so that the posters would fit about halfway under the frame, like the frames would overlap the sides a bit to cover the edges.
I took my scruffy wood and cut one end at a 45-degree angle on my miter saw. Then I measured from the short side of that angled cut and measured out 35 inches. At this mark, I again cut a 45-degree angle – MAKING SURE the shorter side of that cut was at the 35 inch mark, and also making sure the short sides were on the same side of the wood piece. (These will be inside corners.)
First piece cut at 45 degrees.
Once I had this one long piece cut, I didn’t bother measuring the other long piece but simply held this cut piece over the one I needed to cut, then cut my second piece that exact same size, with the exact same angles.
For the shorter pieces, I measured to 23 inches for the inside, shorter sides of my 45-degree cuts. I again cut one piece of wood to this size, then held it over my second piece of wood and cut the second piece without bothering to measure.
Once these were all cut, I made sure my corners were square by laying the pieces arranged like a frame on the floor. I happened to have 2 T-squares, so that made it easy. If you have anything square, you can just set these in the corners to check that everything lines up.
Testing square corners.
Side note: If you don’t have a miter saw, you can use a little hand saw to cut your angles. The 1x2s are nice, soft wood (pine, I think) and easy to cut by hand if you have to.
Step 2: Rough up and sand (optional). To make my wood extra rustic, I took my multitool and cut off chunks from the front of the wood pieces. You could use a little handsaw too, or a chisel.
Cutting off rough chunks.
Once I had rough parts all over the wood pieces, I took my sander and smoothed down all the jagged spots.
Side note: You don’t have to add these rough touches, but it worked for the rustic look I wanted. You could just stain like normal or paint nice, smooth frames too.
Step 3: Stain. I first used a really dark walnut stain and wiped it over the really rough parts that I’d cut out of the wood pieces. This helped to make these spots look extra rustic and aged, almost like “live edge” pieces.
Adding aged, rustic touches.
Once those dark spots were stained, I took a slightly lighter stain and brushed that all over the wood pieces. I didn’t bother with the backsides that would be against the wall anyway.
Stain on.
Step 4: Assemble the frame. When all the stain was dry (I gave it 4 hours), I lightly wiped it with a cloth just to make sure none of it came off. Then, I set all my pieces in position on my work table. I made sure all my corners were square and that all my 45-degree ends lined up nice and flush against each other.
I considered using wood glue for about 30 seconds before just grabbing Brad (my nail gun). You could use wood glue if you can clamp your corners together well enough while the glue dries, but I’d be more comfortable nailing in a few little nails through the corners too. Or, you could use little L-brackets and screw them into the backsides to connect the corners.
Prepping to assemble.
Using my nail gun, I put 2 nail in each corner to hold the 2 pieces together. I worked my way around the frame, making sure to keep everything square.
That was it for building the frame!
Step 5: Hang the poster, then the frame. It drives me crazy when I don’t hang something level, so I grabbed a level and quickly drew a line along the wall where I wanted the top of my poster to go.
Taking a few command strips, I cut them in half and used the smaller pieces on each of the 4 corners to hang the poster. (Using the full strips seemed like overkill for a light poster.) I made sure to hold the top of the poster along my level line, then pressed the command strips onto the wall to hang the poster.
Poster stuck on.
That done, I put a full-sized command strip at the very top of the two top corners of the frame. Then I held the frame up and made sure it covered each edge of the poster before pressing the command strips in place. (You could also nail this in place if you want added security.)
Done!
AFTER: Easy rustic poster frame!
This was such an easy project that I wasn’t sure whether to even post about it, but a few people have asked how to do an easy picture frame, and this is certainly that! You could make these in any custom size you need if you’ve got an abnormal poster size. And you could use any stain or paint you like, of course. I really like the rustic look I achieved (see how the shadows are cool?), and I think it’ll tie in nicely to wood I plan to use elsewhere later!
A while back, I started working on our upstairs linen closet by making a nice little shelf organizer. I mentioned then that I had an idea for changing up the closet’s bifold door, and now I’ve finally gotten around to it! This was pretty simple once I figured it out, and since I used materials I mostly had already, it only cost me $3 and a quick trip to Lowe’s for the magnetic catch.
Best of all – no more bifold door! (I hate them to an irrational degree. 😜) There are 6 doors in this tiny hall, so making this one look different at least lessens the forest of doors.
BEFORE: Ordinary bifold door.
Supplies:
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Step 1: Uninstall the bifold door and remove the unneeded hardware. First, I reached up to the top track and popped down the little pin with the roller that let the door slide on the track. Then, I moved to the top of the other side and popped down the pin that held that door section on the pivot bracket. This freed the door so that I had to catch it, and I carefully lifted the door’s bottom pin out of the bottom pivot bracket to completely free the door.
It’s important to leave that bottom pivot hardware and the top pivot hardware – these will make the door swing open and closed later. But the first top hardware with the roller is no longer needed because the door won’t need to slide on the track. Also, you need to remove the hinges on the backs that hold the door sections together.
Also, if you have a handle on the door, you need to take that off. (This could be replaced later, but I didn’t want or need one.)
Step 2: Cut door if necessary. My doorframe had a kind of overlap around it to cover the gap between the door and the doorframe. Since a swinging door would hit this, I had to cut my bifold door to make it narrower in order to avoid hitting that overlap. I decided, since my doors were hollow, to cut one inner side and take off about 3/4 inch to make the door thinner. By cutting off the inner side, it would leave the outer sides of the door solid – this would look better and also be more solid for attaching my decorative pieces.
Side note: I could have changed the whole doorframe, but that seemed like a lot of work I didn’t want to deal with. If you want to make a kind of hidden door/bookshelf kind of thing, you could do that too by changing the door frame.
Anyway, I took one of the bifold door sections and ran it through my table saw to cut off 3/4 inch. (If you don’t have a table saw, a circular saw or jigsaw would work too.)
Setting my 2 door sections upside down on sawhorses, I lined them up so that the cut side was on the inside, touching against the solid inner side of the other door section.
Cut and thinned inside edge.
Step 3: Fasten door sections together. To make the 2 sections of the bifold door into 1 solid, swinging door, you just need to put something solid across the backsides of the doors. The easiest way to start this is to use the same hinges that joined the doors before, only now you turn them the other way so they act as solid braces (see picture below). This will hold the doors together, but to really keep them from bending at all…
Taking 3 scrap wood pieces, I put wood glue on each and then used Brad (my nail gun) to nail them in place near the top, middle, and bottom of the door. That really made my 2 doors secure as 1 door now.
Flipped hinge and bracing wood.
(These strips of wood will also be nice if I want to screw in hooks to hang bags or whatever on the inside of the closet.)
Since now is the time to flip the door over so that the front side is on top, this is a good test for how solid the door is.
Step 4: Attach the canvas. You could use real canvas or anything you think will be strong enough not to rip/break. I had an old window shade from my daughter’s room that was pretty long, so I used that. It wasn’t quite long enough, but it was wide enough that I’d have extra to run a strip at the top and bottom to cover the whole door. Since I planned to put decorative wood pieces near the top and bottom anyway, I knew I could use those to cover the seams of my “canvas.”
If you’ve got one big piece to work with, obviously that would be easier. But, this wasn’t a bad way to go if you don’t have something big enough.
After cutting my shade free from the roller, I simply measured so that my main piece would be centered vertically on the door, and then I needed about 6 inch strips at either end.
With this plan, I lined up one side of the shade along the side of my door, making sure that it would be the side of the door that would be swinging open, not the side that would be pivoting. I also made sure the top of the shade was 6 inches down from the top of the door.
Then, I quickly used my staple gun to staple the edge of the shade and hold it in place along the long side. I stapled about every 2-3 inches all along that long side first.
To keep the canvas square, I next stapled along the top, but these I spaced out more because I knew I’d also be stapling the 6-inch strip over it anyway.
Stapled top corner of the canvas.
Next, I pulled the shade tight over the far side of the door and stapled the shade along that side. This way, the shade/canvas would wrap around the door, and these staples would never be seen because it was the pivoting side of the door against the doorframe.
With the shade stapled on, I could now cut the excess off past my staples on the door’s pivot side. Again, this side will never be seen, so I didn’t worry too much about cutting it perfectly straight. I just made sure it didn’t go farther than the back edge of the door.
Stapled canvas on the pivot side.
Next, I took my shade leftovers and lined up a strip to cover the top 6-inch gap. I overlapped my main piece only slightly so it wouldn’t be too thick, and I made sure the end lined up with the edge of the main piece. Then I stapled it on. Once those top staples held the strip secure, I wrapped the strip over the pivot side like I’d done with the main piece, then stapled it into the side and cut off the excess.
For the top of the strip, I wrapped this over the door also. The only difference here was that I had to cut a little away to leave space for the door’s pivot hardware. But it was easy to staple the shade secure around this, and again it didn’t really matter what it looked like because you’re never going to see the top of the door.
Canvas strip wrapped at top.
I did pretty much this exact same thing for the bottom 6-inch gap. I cut around the pivot hardware there too. Again, you’re not going to see the bottom.
Canvas strip wrapped at bottom.
Basically, wrap your door in canvas and staple it on, just don’t wrap the side that you’re going to see when opening and closing the door.
Step 5: Paint your art. This is the fun part, of course. Now that you’ve got this giant canvas, paint whatever you want on it! I’d found inspiration from a painting on Pinterest, and I wanted to use paint colors I’d used elsewhere in the house to tie it all together in our blue and green hallway.
I will fully confess that I spent 3 hours on my first attempt before deciding I didn’t like it and starting over. 🤪 But once I changed out what brush I was using, I began to get the look I was after.
Painting in progress.
Once my painting was dry, I carefully took the door upstairs and replaced it. This meant fitting the top pivot pin in place and also the bottom little pin. This allowed the door to pivot once again, and that’s all it took to hold the door in place so that it would swing open and closed.
Step 6: Make 1×2 decorative pieces. With my door in place, I took a lot of 1×2 scraps and figured out how much I would need to cover the edge along the front of the door where the side of the canvas and the staples showed. This was about 79 inches.
I also needed some to go over the seams at the top and bottom, BUT I made sure I didn’t go all the way to the pivot side of the door because that would get in the way when the door opened against the doorframe. I figured this out by simply opening the door and holding a finger where the doorframe touched the door. Then, I measured across the door to that point – about 18 inches.
I also wanted 2 more strips to go across the door like the top and bottom 18-inch pieces. (More on why later.)
I designed all this to mimic the “picture frame” I’d made for my art on another wall of our hallway. (You can see that tutorial here.) To get the look I wanted, I set my miter saw at 30 degrees and cut a bunch of pieces to make shapes like in the picture below.
Frame inspiration.
With my pieces cut, I sanded all the edges to soften the sharp sides and corners.
Next, I painted the wood pieces a nice “Royal Pine” green color to match the inspirational frame and also my floor. (See that whopper of a floor project here.) I had 2 little girl helpers with the first coat, and then I applied a second.
Painting the little pieces.
Step 7: Attach the decorative wood. When the paint was dry, I took all my pieces up to the hallway closet where the door was waiting. I wanted to attach these in place to be sure it would all fit within the doorframe. And I wanted to use a level and be sure the pieces were attached in straight, level lines if the door hung a little crooked – which, fortunately, it didn’t.
Starting at the bottom, I first attached the piece that went across the bottom seam. To give it extra hold, I used a little wood glue on the back. Carefully, I used a level, held the wood in place, and punched in a few nails with Brad.
Because my knees weren’t ready to stand up yet (lol), I next took a little piece to fit vertically under this crosspiece, filling in the space at the bottom of the door. This piece also started the vertical run along the door’s opening side. I leveled this little piece vertically and nailed it on, making sure it covered the staples and the outer edge of the canvas.
Attaching the first pieces.
With those starters on, I moved to the top and repeated this for the crosspiece over the top seam. Next went the vertical piece at the very top.
From there, I moved up and down between the top and the bottom, adding pieces at each end that matched in size. These met in the middle, and I fortunately had measured correctly so that my pieces met just fine to make a nice straight line all the way up the front edge of the door.
Adding vertical pieces.
Lastly, I measured to find where the last 2 decorative crosspieces needed to go to look even. I glued these again, then used a level to get them exactly right before nailing them on.
Step 8: Finishing fixes. With all these pieces nailed on, I needed to use a little wood filler to hide my nail holes. This was easy but of course looked messy once I was done.
Wood filler applied.
All it took to fix this was quick touchups with my same green paint. (And I painted that one wood end that I’d somehow missed. 🤦♀️)
I also ended up painting the side of the door that opened because it looked better and really helped to hide the canvas between the door and the decorative wood edging.
Painted door side.
ALSO, your door might swing open a bit, since the only hardware is on the pivoting side. To fix this, I got a little $3 magnetic cabinet catch and a scrap piece of 1×2. After nailing the 1×2 to the inside of the doorframe, I screwed the catch on the top, then screwed the metal plate onto the side of the door at the same height.
Magnetic catch installed.
This allowed the magnetic catch to hold the door in place when closed, and it’s completely out of the way and barely noticeable because of the baseboard around the door anyway. Just BE SURE to test the placement, and make sure you pick a size that leaves space for your door to open and close correctly.
Side note: If you must, you can put a magnetic catch at the top of the doorframe. I did this for my bifold-converted doors downstairs, and that works too. I just had a bigger gap at the top of this door, so I didn’t want to have to put a bigger piece of wood up there to fill the gap.
Step 9: Add picture frames. This idea had really started my plan in the first place.
While the touchup paint dried, I grabbed 3 spare wooden picture frames and painted them the same green.
When everything was dry, I found 3 small nails and picture hooks. Gently, I hammered them into my top 3 crosspieces, making sure to center the nail placement across the door – so at about 11 and 1/4 inches.
Picture hooks on crosspieces.
Finally, I hung the picture frames on the nails.
All finished, it looks pretty cool, like layers of art but also like pictures just hanging over wallpaper. These frames will be great for hanging my girls’ favorite artwork on display, and it’s somewhere special that can be just for their art but “fancy.”
AFTER: Art door!
I really like how this turned out, and it’s pretty cool that I don’t even need a handle on the door because of the wood. You could add a handle if you wanted, but I thought it would look too busy. And, this way, the whole door hides a bit as a door and looks like an artsy wall nook.
It’s now the…what? 14th week of January? 🤪 We’ve been slammed with snow and ice, gone crazy from school snow days, and got very lucky when a falling tree narrowly missed our garage. Playing outside lets us breathe in some fresh air, but the freezing winds off Lake Michigan also mean we live in one of those places where the air hurts your face.
Inside, where 4 humans, 2 dogs, and 1 cat live, I wish very much for open windows with summery fresh air. Until then, however, I’m doing what I can to add some nice, fresh smells around here.
I found some dried eucalyptus online and decided to use that in our master bathroom. I have fake eucalyptus in a vase by my sink, but I knew I couldn’t put the real thing there because our cat eats everything. Also, we’re low on counter space and I didn’t want to add another vase. So, I decided to hang this dried eucalyptus. The bunch I purchased came with a nice bit of twine for hanging, but I wanted something a little fancier than just a hanging bunch.
What I came up with ended up looking pretty and was SO easy to do! You could make these out of any size embroidery hoop, with as many wooden beads as you can fit. You could even paint the beads different colors if you wanted. Or you could hang the hoop with twine for a more rustic look. There are many things you could add to the steps below, but here’s the quick and easy way I did mine!
Supplies:
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embroidery hoop (mine was the 8 inch inner ring from this set)
wooden beads (mine were the biggest ones from this pack)
Step 1: Prep the eucalyptus and test the beads. I used the largest size beads from the pack I purchased – the 3/4 inch beads, I think. The hole size in these beads was perfect for inserting the eucalyptus stems so that they stuck tight but could still be removed if needed. I first plucked off the leaves from the bottom 2-3 inches of the eucalyptus stems. I also scraped down the places where the leaves connected to make sure the stems would fit through the bead holes. I ended up prepping all but 2 of my eucalyptus stems, because you want some extra for the last step.
Prepping the stems.
Step 2: Glue wooden beads together. Taking my embroidery hoop, I tested with beads until I figured out about how many I would need. Be sure that the beads at either end sit on top of the hoop, not on the inside, so that the eucalyptus will stay straight rather than bending around the hoop. If your end beads don’t sit exactly on the hoop, all you have to do is move the beads a little up or down on the hoop, depending on your placement preference, until everything lines up right. I ended up needing 8 beads.
Keep in mind that your holes will go up and down. To be sure I glued them all together straight, I did 2 at a time. I only had to use one small dot of hot glue to stick 2 beads together, and I pressed them tight until the glue dried. Once I had all my beads paired up, I set them on my counter to make sure they’d be straight. Then I pressed more small dots of hot glue between each pair to connect them all together.
Glueing beads together.
Step 3: Connect bead ends to the hoop. Next I held the strand of beads in place over my hoop and glued one end bead to the front of the hoop. Then I did the other end. Again, make sure the holes aim up and down (according to how it will hang) when attaching to the hoop. To be really sure the beads stayed on, I went all around the backsides of the end beads with glue to really secure them in place.
Glueing beads to the hoop.
Step 4: Insert the eucalyptus. With my eucalyptus already prepped, it was easy to push each stem down through the bead holes. I cut a few shorter to add some depth to the look of things, now that I was arranging the eucalyptus in place.
Stems inserted.
Step 5: Glue eucalyptus to the bottom stems. Remember how I didn’t prep a few eucalyptus stems? I cut these into lengths long enough to cover the exposed, naked stems that stuck through the bottoms of the beads. It took one whole eucalyptus branch plus a little bit of the last one. These short bits I glued onto the empty stems, gently pressing to make sure they stuck. The last long bit of eucalyptus I just tucked behind the beads to fill out the the finished look.
Adding to empty stems.
That was it! I took the finished piece up to my bathroom, tapped in a nail where I wanted to hang it, and hung it by the hoop at the top.
AFTER: Eucalyptus wall hanger!
I really like how this fills in an empty space on my walls (which honestly are pretty cool on their own, and you can find that tutorial here). The eucalyptus hanger looks pretty, adds an organic touch to the room, and smells lovely!
Was this one of the first projects I did in our house? Yes. Have I blogged about it yet? No. 😜 But now is the time! I wanted to be really sure this desk would hold up, and 2 years later it’s still working great, so I think it’s safe to say this project is a good one!
When we first moved in, we knew we wanted to convert this small bedroom into an office. It’s right off our master bedroom, and the closet for this bedroom was perfect to make our master closet bigger by breaking down one wall and closing off the wall of our new office. That was a whole project in and of itself, but having 2 solid walls meeting at a corner meant I had a lot more space to work with for a big office desk.
BEFORE: Small bedroom corner.
BEFORE: Small bedroom closet door.
Once done building my wall back together, I ended up making a cool faux-brick effect over where the closet door used to be. (I have a tutorial on how to do the brick look here.) This forgave any less-than-smooth finishes in my construction process. 😆
The room ready for a new desk!
Before I started on my desk and shelving plan, I tore out the carpet and put down new flooring. And I painted the walls with a blue pretty close to the original, just to give it a fresh coat. Then, it was time for my desk.
Do you have to completely makeover a room before building this desk and shelves? No. But it is important to have the flooring you want first, since the desk legs will rest on the floor for support. Since it’s attached to the wall, nothing moves once you finish building this!
Supplies:
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Step 1: Measure and plan. Your measurements will be unique to your room, of course, but you can plan things out like I did. This first step might take time, but once you have this plan, everything is easy to follow from here.
I wanted to use 1×10 wood for the shelves and 2×10 wood for the desk. So how long did these need to be? My long wall was now 10 ft long running from the corner right to the window, so I decided to stop a foot short of the window to leave some room there. So, the desk along that wall needed to be 9 ft long. My short wall was a little over 7 ft from the doorframe to the corner, so I decided on 6 ft for that side.
How many 1x10s did I need? I figured one piece for each shelf would be plenty wide to hold books and things. I wanted 2 shelves running the full length of my long wall. Then I wanted another shorter shelf below those to separate the space between my husband’s area and my area. And for the other wall, I wanted a set of 3 shorter shelves that would kind of mimic the part on the long wall that would have 3 shelves. I decided to make all these shorter shelves 20 inches long.
Shelf total: I needed two 1x10x10-ft boards. Plus, I needed another 1x10x8-ft board for my 4 shorter, 20-inch shelves.
For the desk itself, how many 2x10s did I need? I stared at the empty floor of our office for a while before deciding that three boards deep would be a good size for the main, long part of our desk. This would give plenty of depth for computer screens and whatever, but it wouldn’t jut out too far into the already-small room. So, I needed 3 boards at the full 9 ft. But for the shorter, 6-foot side, I decided on just 2 boards deep to leave more space in the room. This would be more like a side desk anyway, so it didn’t need to be as deep. So, I needed 2 boards at the 6-foot length. (I planned to stagger how these boards all met in the corner, but I figured having boards at the full lengths to start would be safe.)
Desk total: Three 2x10x10-ft boards and one 2x10x12-ft board.
How was I going to hang the shelves and support the desk? I went over a lot of options and ended up wanting an industrial look to complement what I planned to do with the wood. Because the room was small, I knew I wanted everything to look as simple and sleek as possible, like the desk and shelves were open rather than on bulky, built-in bases.
For the shelves… After shopping around, I found these metal pipe shelving bracket sets. To make sure my wood wouldn’t stretch too far without supports, I decided to do 4 sets along my long wall and just 2 sets for the smaller wall. The nice thing about these is that I could space them really however I wanted, so I could find my studs and hang these pipe brackets, then run the wood of the shelves however far they needed to go beyond where my studs were. I needed 6 sets.
For the desk… I decided to get big shelf L-brackets and connect them to my studs, then set a 2×10 on top and connect the wood from the underside. These brackets would connect to the board closest to the wall and also the middle board, since I bought brackets that were 14 inches long. I ended up needing 8.
To give the middle board extra support and to hold up the front board at all, I wanted pipe legs to match the pipe brackets of the shelves. I decided on 28-inch pipe legs to make the top of the desk come to a comfortable 30 inches (once the 2-inch desk boards were on). I ended up needing 5. And to attach the front board to the middle board, I planned to use 2 mending plates near either end to hold them together.
This was where I had to think through the corner where the desk’s boards would meet. I came up with a staggered plan that I drew out like this:
Rough sketch for staggered corner plan.
This meant my long back board would go the full 9 ft of my desk. My staggered middle board would be short this by the width of my 10-inch board running along the 6-ft wall. (REMEMBER: Wood measurements in stores are approximate, so a “10-inch” board isn’t really 10 inches wide.) The front board would be short by the width of two 10-inch (approximately) boards on that 6-ft wall. Then, the 6-ft wall’s back board would be approximately 10 inches shy of 6 ft. The front board would be short by 2 widths of the approximately 10-inch boards.
Underneath this staggered pattern, I would use my shelf brackets to form a strong corner support, plus a few pipe legs underneath. This was also where one of my mending plates would hold the middle and front board of my long side together. (It’s a busy corner under there, but the only thing visible is the legs!)
SIDE NOTE: You could cut the corners at 45-degree angles to meet at a nice 90-degree corner. Or, you could run one wall’s boards all the way to the corner and then make the other wall’s boards shorter to make the corner. Personally, I liked this staggered look even if it was a little more complicated. 🤷♀️
“What else do we want?” I asked myself…and my husband, who likes bells and whistles. 🤣
I bought 2 sets of keyboard tray hardware, one for each of us. We decided on 28-inches for the length of our trays, so I added another 8-ft 1×10 to my shopping list for good measure.
And wouldn’t it be nice to have a few grommets in the desktop so we could run cords down to hide? Yes, so I bought desk grommets. And because Amazon suggestions get me every time, I also bought a few power grommets with USB ports. (Ok, I might like bells and whistles too.)
I also decided I wanted some hidden storage. To accomplish this, I figured out how to make a kind of hidden cabinet under the desk between my husband’s area and my area. This would also help support the long side of the desk – the desktop’s wood could rest on top of the cabinet. The plan I came up with meant I needed 4 pieces of 2×10 that would be 28 inches tall to fit under the desk and act as the sides of the cabinet. I’d leave the back against the wall open, but for the front I wanted a cabinet door made of 2 pieces of 1×10 with a narrow 1×3 in the middle to be decorative – all being a little less than 28 inches. I’d also needed 2x4s to attach and brace the whole thing together, and I could rest 2x10s or 1x10s (whatever I had leftover from my other cuts) across these to create a shelf. I could have planned for a normal cabinet door with simple hinges, but no. I apparently thought I needed a challenge that day and opted for folding shelf hinges that would flip up the cabinet door and lock so we could use the it as extra table/desk space.
(The above extras are completely optional, of course, but now I’m happy I added them!)
Step 2: Cut the wood. Fortunately my dad let me borrow his truck to bring all my wood home. In my garage, I marked by boards at the lengths I’d decided on and then simply cut them down as planned:
2 boards of 1×10 cut to 9 ft (top 2 shelves, long wall )
4 boards of 1×10 cut to 20 inches (bottom long wall shelf, 3 short wall shelves)
1 board of 2×10 cut to 9 ft (desk back, long wall)
1 board of 2×10 cut to 8 ft 3 inches (desk middle, long wall)
1 board of 2×10 cut to 7 ft 6 inches (desk front, long wall)
1 board of 2×10 cut to 5 ft 3 inches (desk back, short wall)
1 board of 2×10 cut to 4 ft 6 inches (desk front, short wall)
2 boards of 1×10 cut to 28 inches (keyboard trays)
4 boards of 2×10 cut to 28 inches (cabinet sides)
2 boards of 1×10 cut to 26 inches (cabinet door)
1 board of 1×3 cut to 26 inches (cabinet door)
2 scrap boards of 1×6 cut to around 12 inches (for bracing and connecting the cabinet door’s pieces)
6 scrap pieces of 2×4 cut to around 18 inches (for bracing and constructing the cabinet)
Because I trusted my plan from Step 1, all this went pretty quickly.
I wish I could say I had a method to my madness for where I drilled the 2-inch grommet holes with our hole saw, but I kinda just put a few on either end of the back long board, figuring we’d want a few each. I also drilled a few on the back board of the narrow side of the desk in case things needed to be plugged in over there too.
Step 3: Sand. My cut ends all needed to be sanded, as did my grommet holes. Also, I wanted to get rid of rough, harsh corners wherever we’d be most likely to touch against the corners of the desk. I accomplished this by sanding things down to slightly rounded edges at the ends of the boards that would be the ends of my desk. I really, really sanded the front boards along the side that would be the front of the desk. I also paid careful attention to the front corners of the keyboard trays.
This wasn’t too difficult, though time-consuming.
Step 4: Stain/Paint/torch the wood. Yes, I said torch. I wanted to try something to add interest to the desk, so I took my kitchen torch and went over what would become the tops and frontmost sides of the front boards. I also torched the little 1×3 that would add a decorative touch to the cabinet door. I traced the wood grain where I could and used long strokes, painting with fire, so to speak. I love doing this to wood, and it leaves a neat effect.
Torched front board.
For the middle and back boards of the desk as well as the shelf boards, keyboard tray boards, and remaining cabinet wood, I used a charred wood accelerator, which is a kind of aging stain. This stuff is really cool and leaves a different texture and finish than normal stain. I applied this with a roller, which I also think adds to the finished look as opposed to a brush. I applied this to the tops and bottoms of the shelves especially, since we’d be able to see the undersides of the higher shelves.
Rolled on charred wood accelerator.
Or, if you want, you could paint the boards or stain them normally. To each their own. 😆
Step 5: Mark the walls. Before I started screwing into my walls willy-nilly, I first marked where my studs were. I used a stud-finder and then a level to draw a light line down my walls. I made sure to start the line pretty high up so I could use it for my shelves later. For now, going around my walls, I marked on my stud lines at the 28-inch point. This was how high my shelf brackets needed to be placed so that the back boards would rest on the brackets at the same height as the front boards where they’d rest on my 28-inch legs.
Step 6: Attach the shelf brackets. I had 8 studs that made sense for placing desk braces, so I used 8 from my pack. I could have used the whole pack, I suppose, but that seemed sufficient.🤷♀️ Starting on my shorter wall seemed easiest, so I held my first shelf bracket in place over the first stud at my 28-inch mark and screwed the bracket onto the wall. Then I skipped a stud and went to the next one, repeating the process to hang the next bracket. Then I moved to the stud nearest the corner and attached another. So, 3 on that short wall.
Moving to the longer wall, I again selected the stud closest to the corner and attached another bracket. This bracket very nearly reached the other wall’s nearest corner bracket, kind of forming a square against the corner. I knew this would help support the staggered wood of my corner pretty well. I then skipped a few studs and secured another bracket. And in the middle of my long wall, where I knew my cabinet would be, I attached another bracket just to help hold the weight since the cabinet wouldn’t have a back. Then, I moved a few more studs down and attached another bracket. Now at the far end of my long wall, near the window, I attached one last bracket to support that end. This gave me 5 on the longer wall.
Step 7: Connect the desk boards in place on the brackets. I have few pictures of this step because it went pretty fast once I got rolling, plus my hands were full! But, I’m glad my husband thought to take a picture as I was attaching the last board!
Before I did anything, I prepped my pipe legs by screwing on the end flanges and measuring to make sure the assembled legs were 28 inches. I wouldn’t attach these legs yet, but I wanted them to prop up the wood as I went.
With the legs ready, I brought my desk boards up to the office and made sure to start with my longest, 9 ft board. This was the board with the holes for grommets, so I made sure the side with the holes was closest to the wall. I lifted this semi-awkwardly onto the waiting shelf brackets on the long wall, shoving it to fit snug into the corner. Then, I started in the middle and knelt down to screw up through the bracket into the wood. After just one bracket was attached, I knew this was going to work because it was really, really secure on that one bracket. I then easily went along the board and screwed through the other brackets into the rest of the wood. First board on!
To make sure things lined up, I next went to the other wall and started with that back board. I made sure the corner end was pushed tight against the long wall’s back board, and then I started at that corner bracket and screwed it on. Moving to the other brackets, I quickly secured those too.
Going back to the long wall, I got ready to attach the middle board. Since the shelf brackets were 14 inches under my back board, this meant they stuck out to also support the middle board. Easily enough, I held the middle board tight against the back board with its end snug against the corner formed by the side board, and I screwed this middle board into the bracket too. I did this all up and down that middle board. BUT, I also grabbed a few of the legs to help support this middle board. I didn’t attach these, but they reassured me that the board wasn’t going to fall.
Next, I went to the shorter wall and took that second board, which would be the front board on this narrower side of the desk. This was my pretty, burned board. I set it on top of the exposed ends of the brackets and supported it in place with one hand while screwing it on with the other. Again to be safe, I placed a pipe leg under either end of this front board until I was ready to attach it later.
All that was left was the last, front board. First, I knelt down and screwed the mending plates to the bottom of my middle board. I did one near the corner and another near the far end of the desk by the window. This at least would give me something to set the front board on, but I wanted to make sure not to leave the full weight of the board on the jutting plates, just in case it was too heavy. Instead, I positioned more pipe legs under where the front board would sit.
Then I lifted the front board in place and carefully set it on both the mending plates and the pipe legs. I continued to hold the board tight against the middle board, and I knelt down by the corner end and screwed through the mending plate to secure the board. I next went to the other end and did the same with the other mending plate.
That held all the boards connected and in place, but I knew the legs would be necessary to really support the weight.
Placing the long front board.
Step 8: Attach the legs. First, I went to the far end by the window. I had 2 legs waiting there, one under the front board and one under where the middle and back board met. I wiggled these legs a bit so that they each were positioned about 6 inches in from the end of the desk. I made sure the front board’s leg was centered on the underside of that board, and then I screwed the top flange into the bottom of that front board. Next, I went to the other leg and screwed that into where the middle board and back board met.
Back leg at end of long wall.
Back in the corner, I wiggled a propping leg under where the 2 front boards met. I was able to screw the flange into both of these boards so that this leg helped support both front boards. Next, because the middle board of the long wall had the least support at this end, I placed another leg centered under that middle board.
Corner underside with mending plate, legs, and shelving brackets.
Finally, I went to the far end of the shorter desk and attached a leg under the front board, making sure to center and space it the same as I’d done with the long wall’s front board’s leg – 6 inches in from the end.
That was it! Five legs, and the desk was assembled.
Step 9: Attach the keyboard trays. I could have saved this step for later, I suppose, but it helped to visualize where we would be sitting in relation to where I would place the shelves. To attach these, I started with my husband’s space and made sure to come down at least 6 inches from the corner so it wouldn’t be too close a fit against the side desk. I tested by holding the hardware under the desk and pulling the slide part out. When I was happy with how far it would extend from under the desk, I marked the screw holes with a pencil against the underside of the boards. I then attached this first side’s hardware, making sure to measure so it would come out straight. Then, I measured to make space for my 28-inch board that would be the tray, and I held the other side’s hardware here and marked again with a pencil. After double checking my measurements to make sure everything was straight, I screwed that side’s hardware in too.
For my side of the desk, I kind of just figured out how far from the end I wanted to sit, then positioned the tray hardware there. I made sure to match my husband’s side as far as how far back the hardware was positioned so they would look the same. Then I screwed them in place.
Keyboard tray hardware installed.
Lastly, I pulled out the hardware slides, took the 2 boards for my keyboard trays, and rested them on the hardware. From there, I could simply screw them on from the underside. Done! (Ok, I actually added the boards later, but I don’t know why I waited. Doing it at this point would have made more sense.)
Step 10: Position and secure the pipe shelving bracket sets. To better visualize how this would work, I assembled all 6 of the shelf bracket sets first.
Shelf bracket sets assembled.
Then I had to think about this a bit. I knew I would have to set the long top boards in place before totally building the shelves because there would be no way to get the boards in place otherwise. So, I started by figuring out the two ends of the long wall’s shelving first. This way, I could lift a board up and set it in place on the lower of the 2 shelves, then place the higher shelf in place. Then I’d be able to install the middle 2 sets of shelf brackets around the board.
Starting in the corner, I found my first stud line and set one of the pre-constructed shelving bracket sets here. I used my level to get it straight up and down, and then I screwed the bottom flange onto the middle board where the pipe met the desktop. Now it was kind of like a tree, “planted” onto the desk with the tiers of pipes sticking out towards (but not yet secured to) the wall. After climbing a ladder, I started at the very top tier of the waiting pipes and flanges. After making sure that two of the flange’s holes went over the stud line, I used a pencil and marked where the third hole of the flange would be. Then I pushed aside the pipe and flange and quickly drilled a hole, then installed a wall anchor where this third hole would be. Moving the pipe and flange back in place, I screwed the flange to the wall.
I repeated this for the other 3 lower tiers. I don’t know that the wall anchors were necessary, considering most of the screwed went into studs and the base was screwed into the desk wood, but it seemed a good idea to make sure these things would be as sturdy as possible.
That side done, I moved to the window side of the long desk and repeated this at the stud nearest that end.
Once these ends were up, I played around with exactly where I wanted the 2 middle shelves to go. I ended up spacing them so there would be equal distance for my area and my husband’s area, and I put them about 18 inches apart – that would give my 20-inch shelves an inch overhang on either side. I marked on the wall where the lowest flange would need to be screwed in. BUT, I didn’t install these shelving sets until I had my top boards in place.
Shelf bracket sets installed at either end.
Instead, I moved to the shorter wall and stared at it until deciding that I didn’t want to connect these shelves to the desk at all. Since the pipes came out to the middle board, I would have had 2 pipes weirdly connected to the front of the narrower desk there. So, I ended up taking off the bottom sections of these 2 shelving sets, instead only wall-mounting the shelves. I measured to make sure these shelves would start at the same height up from the desk as the long wall’s shelves, and then I marked at this height on my stud line nearest the end of the desk as well as the next stud line over.
Once on my ladder, I again figured out where my wall anchors would need to go. I drilled for these and pushed in my wall anchors, then started at the bottom and attached that lowest flange to the wall. Then I did the second tier. Because I was tired and I wanted to be sure I was doing this right, I left the top tier off and started on the other shelf brackets to make sure it all lined up like I hoped. I screwed the 2 bottom tiers into the wall, took a break to take a picture, and then secured the top tiers to the wall too.
Fortunately, the whole thing was straight and level. Cue sigh of relief.
Installing the short wall shelves.
Step 11: Attach the boards as shelves. First, I started with the 2 long boards. On my ladder near the corner side of the desk, I lifted the first board up and tilted it so that it fed down through the window side’s space of the third tier from the top. I had just enough space to push it far enough so that the corner end could fit down on the third tier of the corner-side shelving set. I slid the board a little until it had equal spacing at each end. Next, I repeated this for the top shelf’s board, resting this one on the second tier down. At last, I had 2 shelves!
Now, I quickly installed the rest of those 2 middle shelving bracket sets. This was easy enough. I fully assembled each set, then slid them into place under and around the top 2 shelves. I had to lift the shelves a little bit to get the flanges under and behind the boards, but that was easy. I first screwed the bottoms into the top of the desk to make sure they stayed put. Then I screwed the tiers in, adding wall anchors because these didn’t line up with my studs.
After that, it was really easy to set the 20-inch boards in place on my shorter shelves.
Shelf wood on!
When I was happy with the overhangs on either sides of the boards, I took a bunch of pipe-fitting U-brackets and fit them over the pipes along the undersides of the shelves. These screwed in easily with little screws, and they held the shelves in place so they didn’t slide around. (REMEMBER: Just make sure that you buy at the right size brackets to fit over your pipes’ size. Mine were 3/4 inch.)
Closeup of U-bracket.
Step 12: Build the cabinet. Keep in mind that I knew this would be mostly hidden, so I didn’t worry about my construction looking too pretty. LOL.
Basically I took 2 of my 28-inch tall 2×10 boards and stood them under the desk to act as the side of the cabinet on my husband’s side. I made sure to space these about 8 inches away from that nearest keyboard tray hardware, figuring this would be a good way to make equal spacing from each of our sides. Next, I grabbed the other 2 of my 28-inch 2×10 boards and positioned them the same way, this time using my side’s keyboard hardware as a guide. I stood back and eyeballed this, and that looked like pretty good positioning underneath the middle shelves above. I wanted to be sure that the cabinet door wouldn’t stick out farther than the desk’s front, so I wiggled the boards back a bit to allow room for the future cabinet door. It was obvious that 2 boards wouldn’t cover the full depth of the desk’s 3 boards, but I liked that there was room along the back wall to let light from the window through and also to allow cords to run back and forth here. It also gave me wiggle room if I was off with how far the cabinet door would stick out.
I took a pencil and traced lines where the 2x10s met the underside of the desktop, and then I pulled all the wood out to more easily assemble the cabinet in the middle of the room.
Measuring the distance between my marks, I set up my 2x10s again so they stood like the sides of my cabinet. Going quickly down to my garage, I took some scrap 2x4s and cut 6 pieces at a max of 18 inches long. These I took back to the office and placed along the floor on the inside side of either cabinet side, and I screwed the bracing 2x4s into the 2x10s to hold them together. I did this for either side at the bottom, and then I placed one along the back side to connect the 2x4s of either side. (See below)
Next, I went about halfway up and screwed a 2×4 into either side, after quickly making sure they were level. I also put one across the back, like I’d done with the base. This would create a base on which to set a shelf, so I checked the measurements and then went down to the leftover 2x10s I had in the garage. I cut 2 boards that would fit across the cabinet’s shelf space, and after a quick sanding, I took these back up to the office. Setting them on the upper 2x4s, I screwed them on as a shelf.
With all this built, I carefully pushed the cabinet under the desk to line up with the pencil marks.
Cabinet base in place.
Cabinet shelf installed.
By this point, I was not thrilled with myself for planning a flip-up cabinet door because I was tired. Also, the hinge hardware was a little wider than I’d realized, and I had to add little scrap pieces of wood onto the fronts of the 2x10s before installing the hinges on the front sides of the cabinet. I also added little strips of 1x2s along the tops of the cabinets where they met the underside of the desk, just because it looked nice finished off that way.
Folding hinge attached and trim wood.
Once the hardware was on, I got to work on the last piece – the cabinet door. I had already stained the two 1×10 pieces and burned the decorative 1×3 strip. Flipping these over to the backside, I made sure they were even and square. Then I took my scrap 1×6 wood pieces and set them with one at the bottom and one at the top, making sure they stretched evenly over all 3 boards. From there, it was easy enough to use little screws and connect these 2 crossing boards to the 3 cabinet door boards underneath.
Next, I found a little shim and set it on the floor in front of the cabinet. Then I set the cabinet door on this shim so the door would have a little gap over the floor and be able to move without scraping into the floor. I shifted the door so that it was evenly positioned in front of the cabinet, sticking out about 2 inches on either side of the cabinet to hide it. Very lightly, I used a pencil and drew a little line on the front side of the desk to mark where the cabinet door needed to be positioned.
All that ready, I moved the door and flipped up the hinges to the locked position. Then, I set the cabinet door on the hinges and lined it up with the pencil marks on the door. I made sure the top of the door was away from the desktop far enough so the door wouldn’t scrape the desk when it opened and closed, and then I crawled under the cabinet door and screwed it onto the hardware.
Underside of cabinet door.
Holding my breath, I unlocked the hinges and folded the cabinet door back into place. It worked! (See below for the cabinet door in the “table” position.)
Step 13: Bells and whistles. Taking my grommets, I went around my desk and popped them into the holes. For the power grommets, I first fed the cords down through the holes, then popped them into place.
AFTER: Long wall finished and table/door flipped up!
DONE! This was a lot of work, but it turned out better than I had planned. I’m glad its not too bulky for our small office, and it holds a lot of computer equipment, cords…and Legos. The top shelves ended up being used mostly for Legos. LOL. But, I managed to squeeze my own books onto a shelf on my side, so…oh, well. If I ever want more shelving space, I could always add another shelf on that top tier.
AFTER: Corner finished!
Lego shelf. LOL
BONUS: Much later, we decided we wanted a drawer for pencils and whatnot, so I ended up making a floating pullout drawer on the short side desk. That project got it’s own tutorial, so you can find that at “DIY Hanging Office Drawer” on my blog.
