Up-cycle Storage Unit

2 Materials
$13
2 Days
Medium

When I placed the re-purposed attic ladder and thrift store shelves in my old craft closet it served it’s purpose. Now that I am changing from a closet to a room I decided I want a storage unit to look more like a piece of furniture. I decided to combine the two pieces to make one nice storage unit. It has to be functional and look pretty.

For my craft room what I would love to have are built in cabinetry with counter tops all around the room. The thing I have to remember, my craft room would have to be easily switched back into a bedroom when we want to sell our home. The cabinets are out of the question, so what I will do instead is make the room functional using what I have with some modifications of course.

For this piece it has to be able to store all of my paints and painting supplies. I don’t have any other piece of  furniture sitting around not being used besides my shelves and re-purposed ladder. I don’t want to use it as is and hate to get rid of them so I grabbed my thinking cap, put it on and figured out how I can build a  storage unit with the shelves and ladder.

Since all my pieces are mismatched, painting everything the same color will help them all blend in nicely. You know I love my Benjamin Moore Advance paint when painting furniture. I am using the color Chantilly Lace. I did the norm, cleaned, sanded, primed and painted.

I attached the wall brackets to the wall where I want the shelves to be.

Since the ladders are attached to the front of the shelf I cut a piece of wainscoting using a nail gun to attach it to each side of the unit to enclose the space in. I used a nail gun to attach the panel to the ladder, it’s not attached to anything else yet.

I didn’t like how sloppy the corners were on the unit so I added trim to each corner. We had this piece of corner trim in the shed, worked great to cover the corners.

I measured the spaces I had between the two middle shelves and purchased canvas storage bins on Amazon to place all my supplies in. 

I measured the spaces I had between the two middle shelves and purchased canvas storage bins on Amazon to place all my supplies in. 


Check out the full tutorial on my up-cycle unit on my blog.

Suggested materials:
  • An old attic ladder and shelving   (thrift stores and broken attic ladder)
  • Wainscoting panel
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Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post!
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 2 comments
  • Sharon Sharon on Jun 09, 2020

    That is quite a creative thinking cap you have there! It looks great!

    • Thanks Sharon. Being a budget DIY working with things I have around the home to create a new purpose requires some creativity. This worked out perfect and is functional and pretty. Thank you again.

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