My brother and I custom built this unit. I couldn’t find the right piece of furniture that had small drawers and deep drawers. I found these Branäs baskets at Ikea, but Ikea doesn’t make a unit like this to hold them. So, I drew up the plans to build this shelf unit. Read more »

I told you I have a lot of doilies from my great-grandmother. I decided to frame a few more for Christmas. I bought these 12-inch square collage frames at Michael’s. I replaced the mats with $1/yard Walmart fabric. I love how the doilies look like snowflakes. (That monster wall heater is the sole—and inefficient—source of warmth in my drafty apartment. Maybe I should knit some mittens next—to wear indoors.) Merry Christmas everyone!

I noticed this stash of cupboard doors at my local salvage yard. The white one was the perfect size to make a serving tray. The old drawer pulls—also found at the salvage yard—made ideal handles. Their swirly shape gave me the inspiration for the pattern I painted. All it took was a little black paint. As with many of my projects, the possibilities are limitless: change the handles, add découpage or fabric, paint it a different color, or just leave it classic white. Read more »

I love these glitter-encrusted Christmas ornaments. I plan to leave them up past the holidays. It’s nice to have a little sparkle around. Here, I mixed my mom’s antique oval mirror with a couple of large mirrors I found on Craigslist. For the small rectangle one, I cut a 12- x 12-inch mirror tile (found at Lowe’s) to fit an 8- x 10-inch thrift-store frame.

I picked up these drawers on Freecycle. They were salvaged from the kitchen of a 1940s house that was demolished. My original plan was to put the drawers on wheels and use them as under-bed storage. Turns out, no two drawers are the same height, which would look janky. So I tried stacking them vertically instead (anchoring them to the wall, of course). You could also hang these drawers as individual shadowboxes. Read more »

I got this idea from the plastic adhesive window coverings Sarah Gaffney used in Sunset’s Menlo Park Idea House. It took me hours and hours to do—and I don’t like it. That is, I don’t like how Plan A turned out—mostly because I apparently got a defective roll of clear Con-Tact paper (see the streaks?). Plus, doesn’t it look like someone took a steamy shower inside of there?

It was obviously time for Plan B. Thanks to a can of frosted glass finish, it looks much better now. Read more »

Kelly and Sarah, two former Sunset coworkers, planned to use this shabby bookshelf in Sunset’s Menlo Park Idea House last summer. After removing the doors, which were in a dire state of disrepair, they painted it. Paint: Benjamin Moore Aura Steam (AF-15) and Caliente (AF-290). Then they decided to kick it to the curb. Knowing I rescue dilapidated furniture, Kelly offered it to me.

It sat in my living room while I hunted for keyhole covers (notice the keys were stuck in rough holes cut in the wood). Finally, I found the perfect keyhole covers (called escutcheons) with finger pulls on eBay. After three days of scraping, gluing, sanding, painting, and reassembling, the doors are hung at last.