Variera panels on a Hemnes nightstand

Materials: RATIONELL VARIERA shelf insert, HEMNES nightstand, L brackets, spray paint

Description: We had a couple of old ice-cube table lamps from IKEA that didn't fit the style of our new bedroom, so I was looking to make something that would allow me to hide them, i.e. some kind of lampshade.

It turns out that the VARIERA shelf insert matches perfectly with the height of the shelf of the HEMNES nightstand. As perfectly as if someone measured them to fit into each other. The VARIERA can actually be jammed upright on the shelf of the HEMNES, creating a panel. To make it even steadier, I attached L brackets at the bottom part of the VARIERA. I used some of the shortest screws that come with the shelf, so they barely stick out on the outer surface.

I spray-painted the panels black to match the nightstand, and just jammed them in place. Now the panels hide the ice-cube lamps, baby monitor, phone charger and all their cords and the nightstands look much nicer, especially with the light on.

~ Annie, Greece

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Kitchen cart/sideboard

Materials: HEMNES secretary desk add-on unit, 2 LAMPLIG chopping boards, casters

Description: I scored a HEMNES secretary desk add-on unit in the As-Is section, and picked up a couple of LAMPLIG chopping boards.

I assembled the HEMNES add-on unit as directed, which, without the secretary desk part, leaves the top open. I decided to install the back panel backwards so the dark finish shows on the rear of the unit, that way I can move the cart around the kitchen without worrying about an ugly backside showing.

Next I installed locking casters on the bottom. Then, I attached the two LAMPLIG chopping boards to the top with L-brackets, and voila! A moveable kitchen cart/sideboard with lots of storage. I even got a couple of stools so I have more seating as well!

~ Jennifer, Massachusetts

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Sidewalk Sandwich Board

Materials: Hemnes 3-drawer, hinges, eye screws, chalkboard paint

Description: The idea for this hack came about as I was disassembling my broken Hemnes 3-drawer and realized the sides of the dresser looked just like the sides of those little chalkboard stands you see outside of bars and cafes.

Supplies:

1. Chalkboard Paint. We decided against spray paint after reading a few reviews that it isn't as durable, and thought it might be a little more manageable to get in the right places since not everything was going to be painted. Granted, the can of paint was $14, but for this hack we barely put a dent in it.
2. Two Hinges. It doesn't really matter what kind of hinges, they just need to be about 1.5 inches in length.
3. Two Eye Screws.
4. Some Twine. You'll only need about a foot/foot and a half, so just use whatever you have around the house.
5. Painter's Tape.
6. Cheap Paintbrush. Any kind. I think mine was about 2 inches wide.
7. A Sharp Knife. Definitely wait until the paint entirely dries before peeling off the painter's tape. Even so, you might have to score along the edge with a sharp knife before attempting it - the paint is thicker than most, so even with the good tape you might hit some patches where the paint wants to peel into the board area.

Total cost: About $20

How To:

1. Take the dresser apart. Keep the left and right side panels and remove all the leftover screws and hardware.
2. Add the hinges. Lay the two pieces face down with the tops together and screw in the open hinges. Make sure you don't put them on backwards - you want the sandwich board to be able to completely fold flat when done.
3. Add the eye screws. Drill a pilot holes on either side of the center bottom interior beam. Then screw them in and tie the twine to either end, to the length you want.
4. Paint. Tape off the edges. When you start your first coat, you have to work fast so that it dries smoothly. I'd recommend painting one vertical section at a time, going left to right and making sure to swipe your paint brush from top to bottom across the whole piece when you're done with that section, so the paint has minor vertical lines.
5. Wait. Wait a full 24 hours before applying a second coat. And another full 24 hours before drawing on it with chalk.
6. Write some drink specials. Then enjoy them. The end.

See more of the sidewalk sandwich board.

~ Lauren, Texas

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Wedded Hemnes Shoe Cabinets [Twined and Painted]

Materials: IKEA Hemnes Shoe Cabinet

Description: Greatly inspired by the Twined Hemnes Shoe Cabinet Hack conducted by Paulo from Canada and ScrapHacker.com.

I wedded the two newly purchased Hemnes happily.

I took out one of the cabinet leg, so instead of having four legs and an ugly gap in between, we now have a three legged cabinet with no gap in between and a top board that is just a little over hanging on both sides.

I am a tool rookie, so pardon me for some of my terms.

YOU WILL NEED:
- Two Hemnes Shoe Cabinets
- Electric drill (battery well charged)
- Different size drill heads
- Ruler
- Pencil

OPTIONAL IF YOU'D LIKE TO PAINT IT
- Paint brushes (one big one small)
- Unwanted jars to hold paint
- Masking tape
- Cotton buds (to stop paint going into drawer pull holes)

ON COMPLETION
- A massage
- Heat rubbing cream
- A place to stretch aching body parts

~ Grace Wang, London UK

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Campaign Inspired Dresser Hack

Materials: Hemnes dresser, sand paper, white semi-gloss paint, flat corner braces, screws, knobs/pulls

Description: This super easy hack involved painting the drawer fronts and adding new decorative hardware for a quick aesthetic update.

After lightly sanding the drawer fronts and wiping them clean, add a few coats of semi-gloss paint. Once they are completely dry, screw in the corner braces on each corner. Then simply attach the knobs or drawer pulls and you're done!

See more of the Campaign Inspired Dresser hack.

~ Lacquer & Linen

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Glamorous girly change table

Materials: Hemnes 3 drawer dresser, Wallpaper, upholstery tacks

Description: Open the ikea box. Pull out all the wood parts that are not painted (they will be the back of the drawers, the drawer sides, the 2 back braces, the drawer bottoms and the back panel. As well as the bag of screws, nails etc and the drawer runners. Put them to one side.
What you should be left with is all the pieces that need wallpaper.
I started with the 3 drawer fronts and the top piece.

I used wallpaper paste to adhere the wallpaper. But this was a dud. It didn'€™t stick the best. If I was to do it again, I would need to find something else. I was tempted to use spray adhesive.
The drawer fronts, I cut the wallpaper over sized and stuck it on. Let it dry and then trimmed it face down with a sharp utility blade.

The top panel, I cut over sized and wrapped the whole piece around and underneath. So when you flipped it over, it was stuck down with about a 7cm border around. Because the top panel overhangs the unit and you could see under it, so it is best to wrap it and it means that the wallpaper will stay securely in place. Used lots of masking tape and paint tins to hold it down while it was drying.

Next I did the top and bottom brace and the 2 panels that go between the 3 drawers. I used Mod Podge to stick these down.

Lastly I did the 2 side panels. As you can see, these panels have a profile where the centre is lower then the side bars. This wasn'€™t going to be very helpful for wallpaper. So what I did was cut down the Ikea cardboard box the cabinet came in. 4 x 400mm x 710mm rectangles. To fill in this void and make it as flush as possible.

I used Mod Podge to stick them down. One on top of the other. Great use of recycling.
I then had to cover this piece with wallpaper.
Now it was the fun part! Bashing in the tacks!

Then finish assembling your cabinet as per the instructions. Attach the new handles and VOILA!!! You did it!

See this link for more in-depth description.

~ Laura, Sydney, Australia

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Hemnes Beautified Barnboard Coffee Table

Materials: Hemnes Square Grey Brown Coffee Table

Description: I loved the size and shape of my Hemnes Coffee Table but thought it needed to be beautified just a bit.

I began by painting the base of this coffee table in Anne Sloans Chalkpaint in French Linen and then sanding with a fine sand paper.

I then cut 5 lengths of 1"(d) x 7.25"(h) pine planks to 36"(l). I hit them with a hammer, crow bar and heavy chains to give them a worn appearance. I then sanded these with a heavy sandpaper to make sure it was smooth & the edges were not sharp.

I began the process by staining the wood with a steel wool and vinegar mixture, this gave the wood a nice aged patina. I then watered down BM Texas Leather to a milky consistency and applied evenly. Then, it was onto my light gray layers.

First I watered down ASCP in French Linen(base color) and applied unevenly, then I filled in the gaps with BM Revere Pewter(watered down). I let dry for a few hours in a cool, dry place and then sanded aggressively and unevenly, letting each plank maintain some originality.

I then adhered it to a mdf base(subfloor) measuring 35 x 35(slightly smaller),from bottom of subfloor. I then flipped it back over planks side up and nailed decorative nails to the top, leaving the pre-drilled holes empty at each corner. I laid the barnboard top over the Hemnes base and adhered it with long roofing nails at each corner.
To finish this top, I used ASCP clear wax to preserve the look.

I couldn't be happier with how it turned out, it is perfect statement piece for the room.

See more of the Hemnes Barnboard coffee table.

~ Jennifer, New York

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Hacker help: How to remove Hemnes drawers?

Photo: IKEA.com

Materials: HEMNES 3 drawer chest

Description: HELP ME ! I'm moving and I'm trying to dismantle my Ikea bookcase. I can't get or figure out how to get the drawers out of the slides, so I can dismantle the rest of the bookcase.

Thank you

~ Russ, Bristol, CT

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Subwoofer in a Drawer

Materials: Hemnes Three-Drawer TV Unit and Onkyo Subwoofer

Description: I have an Onkyo soundsystem hooked up to the TV that sits on my Hemnes TV Unit and the subwoofer is so big that it was almost as tall as the unit when it sat beside it. The speakers themselves were pretty big too, and inspired by the salad bowl speakers I saw on Ikea Hackers, I intent to make me own, smaller, housings for speakers too.

However, when I realized one of my drawers was empty, I decided, what the heck! Why not put the Sub in the drawer!

I didn't think to take a pic of the sub before destroying, but I tore apart the box and separated all the equipment inside, cut holes in the bottom of the drawer for the speaker, for the sub's control panel (cable and power input, output level, etc.), and for the air intake. I mounted the power supply to the side. The wood on the bottom of the drawer was pretty flimsy which wouldn't insulate well, so I used wood from the original box to reinforce the the bottom and make for better sound insulation.

2 hours later, the base was booming and my living room was less cluttered! I was afraid it might rattle the slide brackets, or make my TV vibrate, but you can't even tell the sub is in there!

~ David, Brazil

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Hemnes Stove Hearth

Materials: Hemnes Entertainment center, DIY hearth and mantel

Description: I used a Hemnes entertainment center, minus the center piece. Built a false mantel, and hearth for an electric wood stove. This is the result.

~ Ken, Hudson, Florida

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T-Shirt Filing Hemnes Drawer

Materials: Hemnes Dresser (or any dresser with deep drawers), metal rods

Description: I'€™ve always thought that storing t-shirts and tank tops in drawers was inefficient and messy "if you stack them on top of each other, you'll end up with a huge, disorganized pile. Plus you can'™t see them all at the same time and you always end up looking for the one at the bottom. So I thought about storing them vertically. I tried that, but unfortunately, the mess was still there. I liked it better than the stack though, because I could see all my clothes.

That's when it hit me: we could design some sort of filing system. It would basically be two long rods (acting as rails) and then shorter rods perpendicular to the longer ones, where the t-shirts would be folded over. I thought the drawers from the Hemnes dresser were especially suited for this because they're quite deep.

You can see that the system consists of two towel rods screwed to the drawer sides and more metal rods perpendicular to the long ones. Like in a filing cabinet, you can shift the short rods along the long ones so you'€™re able to shift through your t-shirts.

Here's the how-to:

1. Measure the inside of your drawer face (for the long towel rods)
2. Decide the measurement of your short rods (the distance between the long towel rods); I decided I wanted to fit two tank tops on top of each rod, so I based my measurement on that)
3. Buy towel rods of your desired measurement (if they don't sell your exact measurements, you can cut them down to size with a hand saw) and install them inside the drawer using screws (I recommend you save one of the screws until after you insert the short rods - so screw three of them and leave one for later)
4. Buy thinner metal rods (I think they sell them in rolls). You'll need to add about an inch and a half or two on each side (so three-four inches) to the measure you obtained in 1. to obtain your total measure. Cut them to size. (So, to be clear: the distance between the two long rods + aprox. 3.5 inches = measurement at which to cut the short rods)
Using heavy duty pliers, twist the edges of the short rods to give each edge sort of a ⊂ shape, so each rod will look something like this: ⊂－－⊃ (all joined together, obviously)
5. Insert the short rods into place (you'€™ll need to maneuver them slightly!) and you're ready to use your brand new t-shirt filing system.

We installed this more than a year ago, and I'm happy to report my drawer is still as tidy and organized as the initial pic I posted.

See more of the t-shirt filing system.

~ Ainhoa

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Pharmacy Cabinet from HEMNES Cabinet

Materials: HEMNES Glass-door cabinet

Description: My husband and I were looking for a tall cabinet that fits between the toilet and the wall (39 inches) for our master bath remodel. We were so excited when I found that the HEMNES Glass-door cabinet fits perfectly! But, we wanted to change the sides to glass because we really like the look of the pharmacy cabinet. As always, I searched IKEA Hackers to see if someone shows how to do that and sure enough found this one! Since we wanted more drawers, we used the one with 4 drawers.

1. Remove the wood panel from each side piece (only the top portion) by hitting one of the legs with a rubber mallet.
2. Have the glass company make the glass. (We showed the wood panel we removed from the side piece in step 2 to the glass company so that they can take the exact measurements as well as explained what we were trying to do.)
3. Insert the glass, instead of the wood panels.
4. Assemble the rest of the cabinet. (NOTE: I had to be really careful when I was nailing the back piece to the cabinet because of the glass on the sides.)
5. Paint the sides of each shelf white.

We LOVE how it turned out! This cabinet has so much storage and looks great with our HEMNES vanity, which is another hack we did. We love HEMNES!!!

See more of the pharmacy cabinet from the Hemnes.

~ Asami

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Hemnes Dresser = Kitchen Island

Materials: Hemnes 3-Drawer Chest

Description: Kitchen islands are expensive! And they are not very cute. I took an old Hemnes 3-drawer chest (the bigger one) and re-purposed it into a kitchen island.

I took the backing off the dresser and bought a 4x8ft wainscoting panel which I cut into 3 sections. One large one for the back of the chest and 2 smaller pieces for the sides to tie the whole thing together.


Spray painted the wainscoting and used liquid nails and finishing nails to attach the back panel. Then used liquid nails to attach the smaller two side panels right onto the dresser.

I went on Craigslist and bought an old coffee table and took the top off. I looked for one that had the closest resemblance to a real butcher block to avoid doing extra work. Removed the top of the dresser and used screws to screw the new top on.

Then I bought some decorative scroll brackets to put under the overhang and decorative knobs to finish it off with a country 'kitcheny' feel :)

I saved about $200 by building this island myself and I'm super happy with the results. It's perfect for my size kitchen and decor. I also LOVE having the drawers for storage!

~ Joanne

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Hemnes add on unit transformed into console

Materials: Hemnes desktop + cherry boards + cherry legs

Description: 1. Purchased 3 Hemnes desktop pieces in white. (The have to be Hemnes because those pieces are wood and you need to be able to paint the pieces.)
2. Purchased unfinished table legs in cherry wood from an online vendor (Adams Wood Products).
3. Purchased two unfinished boards from a local hardwood store and measured the needed dimensions to cut the boards.
4. Laminated the boards together using wood glue and then clamped them to hold until dry. Measured again and then cut the laminated boards to fit on top of the Hemnes desktops.

5. Built a makeshift router bit to create a pretty edge on the table top (this took trial and error on other pieces of wood to get it right).

6. Belt sanded the laminated top and hand sanded the table legs.
7. Routed the table top.
8. More sanding to finish.
9. Stained the table top and legs using stain we had from other projects.

10. Put a coat of urethane on the table top and legs.
11. Sanded using fine grit (220) sandpaper.
12. Put another coat of urethane on the table top and legs.
13. Bolted the 3 Hemnes desktops together.

14. Obtained a pint of paint which was matched to the desktops by Home Depot.
15. Painted the trim pieces which we had left over from other projects.
16. Glued the legs to the bottom of the bolted together desktops, waited for it to dry and turned the whole thing back over.
17. Set the table top on and nailed the trim pieces to the top, under the table top, bottom all the way around and two pieces down the sides of the center desktop to make it look more like one piece.

~ Terri Sanne

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