DIY Cafe Shelf {for my laundry room}

Today, I want to share with you how I made the shelf in our laundry room.

I was wanting a shelf above the washer and dryer, so I decided to make one similar to the ones I had made for our kitchen. I made these after being inspired by the ones I saw in Ballard Designs catalog.

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You can see the tutorial for these shelves, HERE.

The shelf I was going to make for my laundry room would be a little bit bigger, and I wanted to paint it white to match the board and batten.

Here are the supplies I used:

1. Two corbels from Home Depot (on clearance for $4.00 a piece!)

Home Depot has the best supply of corbels anywhere, btw!

2. A piece of wood for the shelf. (I bought a solid pine panel at Lowe’s for $9.50.)

3. Trim for the edges of the shelf. I bought some at Lowe’s for about $6.00. You can pick whatever type of trim you like.

First, I had to cut the trim in 45 degree angles for the corners of my shelf.

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I used my husbands power saw, but you can use a simple miter box instead. There are around $5.00 at Lowe’s.

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It would look something like this when cutting with a miter box…

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I marked where I needed the trim to stop on the back of my shelf.

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Then I cut the trim for the back of my shelf using a straight cut.

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After cutting my trim pieces, I nailed them to the wood shelf.

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When you nail the trim on, it will leave little nail holes in your wood.

Just fill them up with some wood filler..

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And it will look something like this…

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Allow the wood filler to dry, then sand and paint.

The back of the corbels look like this…

I screwed two wood screws into my board and batten and attached the corbels.

Then I used a little bit of elbow grease to pound down on the corbels until they were attached. :)

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Next, I used screws to attach the shelf to the corbels. (You can use nails if you want to.)

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Notice the notches in the wood shelf? My hubby had to do those to make the shelf fit flatly against the wall.

All I had left to do was paint it white!

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I was able to make this shelf for less than $25.00. Not bad!

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This last picture was taken with the lights off. It gives a truer picture of the color of our walls.

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I am so happy with my shelf!  You could definitely make one of these too!  If you try it, let me know.

Have a blessed day!

Traci

Linking to…
UndertheTableandDreamingThe Girl Creative

34 Comments

  11. This is great!! I was looking for something like this!! You are the perfect combo of handy and cute! Thanks for walking us through it!

    Reply

  16. Ok first of all, love the shelf! I loved them the first time you made them! Second that little fan on the shelf??? OMGoodness! In LOVE! By the way I absolutely adore everything you have done in your house! Its beautiful!

    Reply

  17. Accidentally hit submit before I was done gushing! LOL
    Anyway, I love everything you have done but by far my favorite is your laundry room you built! It is perfect and so smart!

    Reply

  25. Thank you so much for sharing. I’ve really wanted to start a blog but have been too afraid. I definitely struggle with feeling like I don’t have enough to offer and that my creativity is lacking compared to so many in blog land. I really appreciate your honesty. I feel encouraged, thank you!

    Sarah

    Reply

  30. You make it look so easy! We just added a 4X10 space to our laundry room to make a large mudroom and I want to board and batten. What did you use as your ledge? I like the rounded edge rather than the straight edge I get with a 1X1&1/2.

    Reply

  31. I love these and have been admiring shelves such as these for a long time. They’re expensive but now, thanks to you, I can have them. I can’t thank you enough for the detailed tutorials you provide. You are such a blessing to your readers.

    Reply

  32. Thank You for the tutorial on making the shelves for your laundry room area. Great Job! I’ve been wanting some shelves installed in our garage for me to store my nursery pots on so they’ll be near the tub of potting mix. We have left over pine shelves that used to be in a bedroom closet and there are some metal brackets here and I was planning on just using them if I can get somebody to put them up for me. Would rather have a cabinet installed but DH is not physically able to do these handyman jobs anymore so I will either have to learn to do it myself or hire it to be done.

    I admire you for learning to do it yourself. I’m proud of you!

    Reply

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