She's Crafty

For a long time I've loathed that we have no utility closet. Our vacuum, broom, dust pan, etc all sit out and about, for all the world to see. They're not exactly in keeping with the overall design style for the house and I really want them hidden.

We do have a coat closet that currently stores coats (duh!), the iron, ironing board and a box of miscellaneous stuff. This closet seems ideal for the vacuum, etc to go in, but is a little short on space. My solution? Have a coat rack that will hang outside the closet to free up space inside. So, to the internet to search for said coat rack.

My first find - this galvanized steel one from CB2. I dig the overall look, but it's not right for my living room.

There's also this one, from IKEA. Better than the last one as far as making sense with my decor, but not very substantial.

And then there's this one, from JCPenney. I like the addition of the mirror, but it's a little too rustic and $90 for a coat rack isn't in the budget.

I decided I'd be better off making my own, and picked up all the supplies while at IKEA (with a slight side trip to Home Depot). Here's the goods:

Cabinet door from the AS-IS Department. Four 12x12 mirror tiles, four hooks, glass cutter, 220 grit sandpaper, straight edge, E-6000 heavy duty glue.

I started by measuring out the space that needed mirror and did a little math to determine what cuts I needed to make. I marked my lines carefully, making sure I was exact in length and that the line squared up to the edge of the tile.

Then I got to cutting.

This little tool doesn't require a lot of pressure. The goal is just to score the top layer of the glass. Then you put a dowel (or in my case a pencil) under the scored bit, and push down on both sides until the glass snaps. I had a couple errant breaks, but for the most part the glass broke exactly where I wanted it to, resulting in this:

A stack of tiles cut to size. Upon laying the tiles on the cabinet door I realized one was a bit off though. Grrr.... It's impossible to trim off slivers of glass, so back to the literal cutting board to come up with a new design that could be salvaged from my leftover pieces.

Once that was done, it was time to sand the edges of the glass. It's important to sand from back to front on mirrors. If you sand the other direction you'll end up scratching your glass.

I laid the tiles out on the cabinet door again and placed the hooks as well. I marked their spots and got started on screwing them in.

Once done that, it was back to the tiles. I slapped some heavy duty glue on the back of them (keep in mind a little goes a long way)...



And then started putting them in place. This glue doesn't adhere immediately, so you have a little time to push things around to get them lined up perfectly.



The result - my new, homemade, mirrored coat rack. It's far from perfect (definitely needs to be cleaned), and still needs to have some hardware attached to the back so that it'll actually hang on the wall, but it's done and it's cheap. $22 to be exact.




She's crafty.
She get's around.
She's crafty.
She's always down.
She's crafty.
She's got a gripe.
She's crafty.
And she's just my type.

Thanks to the Beastie Boys for providing the theme music for my latest project!