A Magazine Holder For Our Small Bathroom!

by Hillela G.

3 Materials

We recently inherited a year’s worth of New Yorker magazines. And where better to store this stash than the bathroom? But how?!

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And so, I set out to make a magazine holder suitable for our limited space bathroom!

It must have been my lucky day because on my way home from work, I passed a house that had clearly just moved. It was a box-lovers dream come true. Though in my case, I only need the one box, and that is how I found the box destined to become my next project.

And so I measured out my cardboard pieces needed. The sides of the magazine holder measured 17x11.5x9.5 .The spine at 17x6, The front flap at 9.5 x6 and the bottom at 11 x 6.

I learned through this process that knives and box cutters are much handier at cutting cardboard than regular scissors. Scissors do work, but I would not refer to them as my tool of choice for this project.

Once the pieces were cut, it was time to put them together like one of those 3D puzzles.

I whipped out the good ol’ hot glue gun and attached the pieces.

The glue dries pretty fast so as long as you hold the 2 pieces of cardboard in place for a minute or so, it forms a pretty stable bond and you can safely move on to gluing the next piece.

Once the container was put together, it was time to give it a stylish makeover.

Enter contact paper!

I picked up this nifty contact paper at the local crafts store- no one will ever know that its not real wood!

My contact-paper-experienced friend helped me cut, measure, and apply the contact paper. She gave me a few handy tips:

Cut your piece a bit larger than the side that you measure so that you can overlap the pieces of contact paper and avoid gaps (and, its not hard to trim excess contact paper where needed).

Also, start removing just one corner of the contact paper and slowly ease the rest of the backing off, smoothing the paper down as you go to avoid bubbling. If bubbles do form ( it happens, don’t fear) you can lift the contact paper back up as far as the beginning of the bubble and reapply it, smoothing as you go.

Once we finished applying the exterior paper, I added a simple maroon contact paper lining.

And voila! I’m loving my new magazine holder! Perfect fit in the narrow space between the toilet and the wall! Here’s to some good reads!

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2 of 17 comments

Rhonda on Feb 25, 2019

Great idea! However, the next time you take a photo of a bathroom project you should put down the toilet seat, it will make your bathroom look more neat and the photo more pleasant to look at.
But I am definitely trying this. Thanks!

4 Reply
Jcm11983297 on Apr 06, 2023

Magazine holders are available in discount stores quite inexpensive and easily put in a tight space.

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