Floating Shelves

Another building project!  Plans from Knock Off Wood again. 

Modern looking floating shelves.  They look so clean and crisp to me. 

Ana's plan is for 3 shelves, 6 feet wide each.

I followed the plans as they are and ended up with the 3 shelves, and each shelf cost me $10.00 each, so $30.00 total.
I think you can buy similar shelves from IKEA for $30.00 each.
So for this project, $90 total vs $30.00 total is significant to me.
ALSO,
From the scraps, I have enough to build 3 more little shelves 2 feet wide.  I plan to make them in the future.

But for these shelves, my mom and I made them together.
My husband did help screw them into the studs.

I'd bought the supplies and my mom was here for a few days helping us get unpacked and settled, and I told her the plans to make the shelves eventually, and she said she "wanted in on this project" so we made them before she had to leave.  It was pretty fun and quick.

Because the supplies are so thin, we didn't use any major tools, so all you need is:

power drill

hammer

saw (I used my $15 plastic miter box/saw to help make straight cuts)

clamps

So if you'd like to start building something, I'd say this would be a good starter project because it's not that big of an investment on supplies, and you don't need major tools.

Anyway, following the plan from Knock Off Wood you make the shelf frames,

These get screwed to the studs in your wall and hold everything.

Then you make the decorative boxes that slide right over the frames.

Here's the skeleton of the box, then you nail thin 1/4" luan on top and bottom to make the box.

Once you have the 3 boxes and 3 frames, match them up to see which best fit.  The boxes should fit snugly on your frames, because you don't nail or secure them to the frames, they just slide on so they should be a tight fit.

After sanding the 3 boxes, I primed with an oil based primer for durability, then painted them with 2 coats of semi-gloss Behr white paint.  The color is Popped Corn, left from painting the doors and kitchen cabinets.

Here's Rhett securing 2 of the frames in our office/ craft room.

The finished shelves are 7.75" wide, so not a huge space taker as far as sticking out from the wall.

Then after the boxes had dried, we just pushed them over their assigned frame.

The third shelf went all alone in the dining room.

Now to stock them!

You can see my jars of silverware I posted earlier and I bet you can guess where I'm putting them too.

You can also see the little bag of chocolate covered cinnamon bears my mom and I have been eating the whole time she was here!

Hope you come back around when I get to show you the rooms finished with these shelves stocked.

And if you have the need of some modern, clean storage, make some yourself, after all two girls made these babies all by ourselves!