Cheap Bookcase Makeover

Cheap Bookcase Makeover

Hello friends! I can't believe we have already arrived at the week of Thanksgiving!

While most other bloggers are beginning to share exciting holiday stuff, I'm going to be a little different over here and am going to start sharing the new baby's space! Just like Tristan's room, I will start by showing you the different DIYs that went into it before doing the big reveal and breakdown.

Today's post will be about a couple of mini furniture makeovers. I say mini because they were super simple and only required a little bit of wood and some paint.

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• Cheap Bookcase (mine is old but this is the closest I could find)
• 1x2s
• 1x4s
• Finishing nails
• Beadboard sheet
• Primer
• Paint
• Caulk

So I've had this bookcase since I was about 10, can you believe it?! Even though it has held up surprisingly well for being 18 years old, I knew that I wanted to dress it up a little to use as a cute spot to put baby essentials.

I began by tearing off the cardboard back since I was going to replace it with beadboard.

Next, I cut some legs out of a 1x2 by measuring the height of the bookcase plus 2.5". Each leg was composed of two pieces, one that attached to the side and one that attached to that. I used liquid nails and then went back over each with a couple of finishing nails for extra stability.

The lighting in the above picture is terrible, but hopefully this one gives you a better idea! This is the back of the bookcase and you can see that I left a small gap to fit the beadboard back. Ideally it would be easier to attach the beadboard first, but I needed the hubby to do that part and was too anxious to get started!

Once all legs were attached, I cut another piece out of 1x2 to use as trim for the top and bottom of the sides (the masking tape was what I used to hold the liquid nails as it was drying before I put in the finishing nails).

Next, I cut planks out of 1x4s and attached them to the top, again with liquid nails reinforced by actual nails.

I then framed the planked top with 1x2s.

Finally my piece of beadboard was cut and ready to nail to the back. My measurement on the gap that I left was a little off but I still made it work :)

Looking good so far! I went around and filled all of my nail holes and the preset holes for the shelf with wood filler. Buuuuuut it was still missing something. I realized that I needed some trim on the bottom so I cut that from a 1x4.

There. That's better!

I gave the entire thing a coat of primer and painted the bottom white and the top a very light gray. After caulking and a coat of polycrylic, this is what I ended up with.

I love how the beadboard back turned out, it looks absolutely gorgeous. I tried not to overdecorate so that it can still be seen!

I gave the exact same treatment to my childhood nightstand. I think this thing is even older than the bookcase.

I found the star knob at Hobby Lobby and it fits the room perfectly.

The difference isn't huge but overall I feel like they look more like actual pieces of furniture instead of just cheap laminate. It was a nice cheap fix and was a much better option than shelling out more money for brand new furniture. :)

And wouldn't you know it, the day that I was working on these, one of our neighbors put out three-- yes THREE similar bookcases for free on the curb! I was so tempted to snatch them all up, but I knew that they would probably end up taking up room in the garage for months until I got around to them. So as painful as it was, I passed haha.

Linking up to these awesome parties!

This post was featured on Be Inspired hosted by Elizabeth & Co and Fall into Fall hosted by DIY by Design. Click on the images below to take you the feature posts!

Original article and pictures take www.simplybeautifulbyangela.com site