The (Fruit) Peel Sessions
With all the little projects and furniture shuffling I’ve been doing lately I’ve been finding that I’m having a problem with overall scale – so for each new / large item I bring in one of the older, larger items must either move or they gots to go!
In context, when that old furniture cart made it’s way into my living room my old shelving units had to clear out… They fit perfectly in my old place but here, with all my new stuff, they just aren’t working all that well so I decided to put some new shelving in upstairs in a completely unused section of my bedroom.
Problem; a couple of weeks ago my dad and I installed a new baseboard heater (no ducts / vents on the very top floor) making putting any shelving against that wall pretty much impossible.
Solution; I saw a posting for some antique fruit crates on Craigslist pretty cheap and thought, instant shelving. It’s a super simple project and takes almost no time.
Find & mark your studs…
Put ‘er on pucks, bahd! In my case I wanted to mount them at 18″ to give a little space between the shelving and the heater and it just so happens that those old Ikea side tables are 18″ in height.
Make sure your shelves are level… Tits on!
Screw a bunch of screws into ‘em and you’re basically done. For now I’ve just screwed the bottom three into the wall so that I can play with different arrangements and whatnot and I may re-enforce the bottom of the unit – either with two legs, some additional support along the back or some combination of the two.
Now comes the challenge of deciding what goes where and collecting more good guys to hang out on these good guys…
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On a somewhat related note; Ace & Kaelah (Arcee & Kaewonder) have an amazing soul / funk mix series called “Cratery” which is seriously incredible thus far… Download and boogie. Do it.
on November 19th, 2009 at 10:20 am
I get a google alert for Peel Sessions and it brings me here to you. HAHA. Good re-use man. I dig it.
on November 19th, 2009 at 11:05 am
Matt, looks awesome. I’ve been following your home projects and I can’t help but admire your eye for this sort of thing.
A question: In regards to coming across something on craigslist: Do you have something in mind and start looking for it, or do you just peruse the site that much?
I just moved into a new place and haven’t really done anything with it yet, so I’m always looking for ideas.
on November 19th, 2009 at 1:02 pm
I do check Craigslist and eBay a lot and often have things in mind that I’ll hunt for relentlessly but just as often I’ll see something that tickles my fancy and has the right price and then I think of a way to use it…
In this example, my friend Tami’s place had some old crates used as shelving when she moved in which looked cool… I mulled it over for a bit, looked around and didn’t see anything fantastic but when a grip of them came up for an ok price I just said fuck it, bought them, and then figured out how best to use them.
The beauty of a project like this is it’s pretty cheap and easy so if I don’t like it, I’ll just take it all down and then either use the crates for something else, give them to a friend or sell them for close to what I paid for them…
Mostly I just go around gathering ideas from friends, shops, sites and whatnot and then think about how I might be able to take those ideas and make something my own out of them… If nothing else, I’ll just try to do it cheaper…
I’ll have a post in coming weeks about antique trouble / cage lights… Pretty badass but usually super expensive… The turn of the century ones with the wooden handles are especially beautiful, but again, expensive… So this week I tracked down a later model one for about $20 that I’ll tinker with until it looks and feels more like one of those older ones… I’ve got a few ideas for rewiring and adding a wooden handle that I may pilfer from a non-working bicycle pump… If all goes well, I’ll have a pretty cool little table lamp for not much more than $30…
Sure, it won’t have the history and character that one of those old guys has, and I do appreciate that a hell of a lot, but sometimes you just can’t afford it… At the same time, making something yourself adds a sense of history and character that just can’t be bought… and I like that.
on November 19th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
Ahhh. I’ve been looking for some old crates for a decent price for sooooo long!
They look fantastic!
on February 6th, 2010 at 9:38 am
The crates look great. I saw your post about your heating concerns. If you aren’t getting enough heat you can always get some shallow boards (1×3’s maybe) and put them in between the shelves and the wall where you screwed into the studs. This will give enough space for the warm air to convect upwards.
on February 7th, 2010 at 6:10 pm
Thanks Matthew! Funny you should mention that because this is exactly what I’m doing… I picked up the wood at some point last week but hadn’t gotten around to doing mounting them yet!