Most of the crap I find on Pinterest is … well … crap. But I went looking for storage ideas today and liked this excellent little space-saver so much I wound up using it as my excuse du jour for taking a field trip to the hardware store.
The whole unit fits neatly between the fridge and the wall.
The version somebody pinned from Classy Clutter (which is an excellent site, BTW) looked prettier than mine, but I’m lazy. And cheap. And lazy. And my station wagon is in the shop at the moment, getting its transmission rebuilt, so I didn’t have a good way to bring home a ginormous piece of bead board for the back. And did I mention I’m lazy?
Here it is before I loaded it, so you can see how it’s put together.
If I feel ambitious later, I can unload it and take it outside and hit it with a few coats of spray paint, but I think we all know that isn’t going to happen.
Anyway, instructions for my version are below the fold. I made it four feet high, partly because of the aforementioned station-wagon-going-AWOL issue, partly because my refrigerator is only five feet high, and partly because I could buy an eight-foot-long board and have it cut in half for $2.22.
Materials:
Two 48-inch-long 1x4s
Three 24-inch-long 1x4s
Eight yardsticks
Eight deck screws
Two hefty casters (you want this kind)
12 quarter-inch, L-shaped shelf brackets
A handle
16 small finishing nails
Tools:
Drill with 1/16th-inch, 3/32nd-inch and 1/4-inch bits
Screwdriver bits to match your screws
Cordless screwdriver (optional, but it makes installing the casters easier)
Hammer
Tape measure
Saw
Here is the key to this whole project: Drill pilot holes for EVERYTHING. If you don’t, you’ll split the wood.
Start by drilling two 3/32nd-inch pilot holes at the top and bottom of each 48-inch board.
Drill matching pilot holes into the ends of two 24-inch boards. These will be the top and bottom of the shelf unit.
Before you assemble anything, drill three pairs of 1/4-inch holes in each of the 48-inch boards. You want the pairs spaced a foot apart, and you want each hole about a half-inch from the edge of the board.
Grab one of the 24-inch boards you drilled the pilot holes into and attach the casters to the bottom, a couple of inches from each end.
Attach the handle to one of the 48-inch boards, about a foot and a half from the top.
Using the pilot holes you drilled, assemble the frame with deck screws. (Make sure you assemble it so the casters are on the bottom and the handle is on the outside, obviously.)
Cut your yardsticks to the width of the frame. Mine ended up being about 25 3/8 inches wide.
Drill 1/16th-inch pilot holes in the ends of the yardsticks and use a hammer and finishing nails to tack them to the frame about three inches above each set of 1/4-inch holes and about three inches above the bottom shelf. Flip the unit over and repeat this process on the other side. (I used beehive frame nails for mine, because I had some on hand.)
Insert the L-shaped shelf brackets into the quarter-inch holes you drilled and slip the remaining boards onto the brackets. You may have to trim the ends of the boards just slightly to get them to fit.
Slip the unit between the refrigerator and the wall and use it to store canned goods, boxes of pasta or other smallish groceries.
Action shot. As you can see, it holds quite a bit of stuff. I put some cup hooks on the underside of the top board in case I think of a good use for them later.
All told, I spent less than $25 on materials for mine, and I think it took about an hour and a half to put together.
If you live in a small house, where storage space is at a premium, this is a really handy way to reclaim some wasted space.
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