🖼️
The project:
My Son has started high school and needed a space to do his homework and access a computer. This little space is basically a landing upstairs and is where the kids have their TV and play video games but wasn’t being utilised well. I also wanted a space to put linen and towels for the bedrooms and bathrooms upstairs.
So this room needed to be a calm study place and a place for the kids to unwind and relax and provide some needed storage for the house. Tall order for a small space.
- Materials:
Cabinets were ordered from an online joinery website. They are slightly less deep than a standard cabinet as it’s a narrow room and off the shelf options wouldn’t work. I got the doors and filler panels in Laminex Flint Green, and got Bunnings to match the colour in Taubmans super enamel paint so I could paint the trim and kick boards.
Bench Top and leg - 2400 x 600 x 33mm Hardwood Laminated Panel - 2 of.
Wall panels - Specrite oak half round wall panels 2.7mx600. I can’t find these online and only found them at one Bunnings store in Sydney. They are beautiful.
Trim Pieces - 138mmx18 pre primed finger jointed pine moulding 2at 5.4 m
Kick boards - 120x18 pre primed finger jointed pine moulding 1 at 2.7m
Paint - taubmans enamel in laminex green flint And in Dulux wash and wear in the same colour for under the desk.
There also some bench top joiners and 90 degree angles for joining the bench tops together and to the cabinet.
The book shelves are made from 2 specrite 1800x 600mm Tasmanian Oak Boards.
- Tools:
Circular Saw
Drop saw (But you can use a circular saw)
Multi tool
Sander
Drill and Driver
Measuring tools
3D Printer for cable management and Smart Home Wall.
- Step 1:
Measure out your space - I put tape on the walls with a level to help me easily line up cabinets. I used yellow tape to park out my studs so I know where to attach things to the walls. Also patch and paint any problem areas on the walls.
- Step 2:
Put your Cabinets together. I started in the corner and worked out. I also cut all pass throughs in the cabinets before I put them together for passing cables through. The two black boxes on the wall is 2 3D printed parts to run power and HDMI Cables through to hide them behind the wall so you don’t see them hanging from the TV.
- Step 3:
at this stage I put my 3D printed grids into the cabinets for cable management and mounted my power boards.
- Step 4:
once all the cabinets are in, mount the end panels on the cabinets. Cut out to fit around skirting boards and cut any holes for cable pass throughs. I also painted the wall that would be under the desk in the same colour as the end panels and cabinets.
- Step 5:
attach kick boards. I used another 3D print to create a clip that was attached to the kickboard and it allows you to clip the kick boards to the cabinet feet. You can buy these as well.
This is also the point I put all the 90degree angles into the tops of the cabinets to attach the bench top. Easier now than later.
- Step 6:
now it’s time for the bench tops. Scribe the bench tops to the wall . Cut space for cables to come up from under the top and cut holes for bench top joiners.
I sanded the bench tops to 180 grit - up from 80. These were really knotty and rough tops so they needed a lot of work for finishing. I filled cracks and knots with a mixture of wood glue and saw dust from sanding.
I used Fiddes Hard wax oil in clear to finish. It’s low odour, and gives a beautiful finish. I used the same for the bookshelves and the wall panels.
- Step 7:
I cut the bottom trim piece to size, and painted them in Enamel and mounted it to the wall using screws into the studs and liquid nails. This gave me a clean level line for the wall panels to sit on. It also covered any inconsistencies in my scribing of the bench top to the wall.
- Step 8:
Cut wall panels to size and mount to the wall using liquid nails and nails. I also used the multi tool to cut holes to fit the panels around the TV mount, cable openings and the shelf brackets.
- Step 9:
I cut 9 small pieces of the off cut 138x18 moulding and attached them to the studs at the top above the wall panels. I then cut the top moulding to size and painted it. I attached the top wall panel to the 9 pieces of timber to allow the top piece to sit just over the top of the wall panels. This gave it a nice straight level line to finish the wall off. It covers any small mistakes with cutting the wall panels to length.
- Step 10:
I then mounted the shelves and added the doors and handles. And we are done!
You can see to the left of the light things mounted to the side of the cabinet. This is the same grid system I 3D printed for inside the cabinet. It holds my Router and smart home hubs. It tucks them around the corner out of sight and makes use of the vertical space.
