DIY Glam Industrial Filing Cabinet

My latest home decorating project is to convert my third bedroom into a "library", complete with a wall of books, comfortable seating, a writing desk and a place to store papers (at least temporarily until I can do something else with them). The room is still a work in progress, but this filing cabinet checks off the "place to store papers" box on my list.
I had been watching this beautiful desk from ZGallerie.com for a long time. When it finally came on sale, I bit the bullet and bought it. It is what I like to call the "glam industrial" style...industrial form with glam finishes. The only issue with it is that there isn't much storage, so I decided to build my own "glam industrial" filing cabinet to go with it. And since I splurged on the desk, I didn't want to spend very much money :)
I started with a closet organizer shelf that was left over from another project. It was 12" wide and deep...the perfect size for letter-size files. I had previously cut it down to 24" high, which was the perfect height to fit under my desk and hold 2 boxes of files.


Side note: If you're planning on doing something like this for your own filing cabinet and desk, don't forget to include the wheel height of the casters (added below) when you're figuring out how high the shelving unit should be.


The only problem with it was the color...melamine white just didn't fit in with my "industrial glam" look.
Nothing that a little silver spray paint can't solve! I took the shelf apart and spray-painted the sides and edges of all of the boards.
These painter pyramids are great for this kind of project. They raised the boards off the plastic drop cloth so I could paint the edges easily, without worrying about it sticking to the plastic.
When the paint was dry, I put the shelf back together and screwed these casters on to the bottom of it. They add to the industrial look and make it really easy to move the shelf around if I need to. (They also come with locks that can stop it from moving if I want it to stay in one place.)
The final step was to add these industrial looking file boxes. I stumbled across them by accident while I was searching amazon.com for some plain black file boxes (my original thought was to glue on some silver buttons that would look like the "rivets" that the desk has.) But then I saw these...They're made from heavy duty cardboard that looks like black leather. You put them together with those big silver snaps. They come with the silver metal handle (which also makes them easy to pull out). They're the perfect size. And they cost less than $10. I could not have found a better match!
Then I just had to wheel the filing "cabinet" into place and start filing! The whole project took less than a day to put together and does exactly what I wanted it to.


To see more information about this project, click the link below to open my post.
Wanda @ From House To Home
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  2 questions
  • Amelia Amelia on Dec 20, 2015
    Did you find the file boxes on Amazon? If not, where did you find them? Amy, Lk Mary, Florida
  • Lynnda Lynnda on Dec 21, 2015
    Great job! Off the topic question I could not help but notice the stunning art work on your wall. May I ask where did you purchase the music notes and piano keys art?
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