Tag: make

home: made [ furniture legs ] 

home: made [ furniture legs ] 

It’s the simplest idea but incredibly effective. Adding new legs to a piece of new (or old) furniture can alter the whole design, era, feel of the piece. It’s a great way to update a set of drawers, chair, unit or shelving but also to make it suit the style or look of a room. Legs can reinvent a unit. 

Find simple floor based IKEA units or old legless vintage sideboards or chests of drawers and give them a better design with the right set of legs, whether they are short and stubby, tapered, midcentury, industrial or traditional mounded wood – for not much money you may just transform a piece of furniture you thought wasn’t suitable. 

Of course additionally you can spray, paint, strip or cover a piece too but it’s the initial legs addition that makes a huge impact. 

Try Buzzfeed or Pinterest for ideas and then head to PrettyPegs , Ebay or Amazon for legs. 

Great variety of choice from PrettyPegs

home: made [ hanging plant shelf ] 

home: made [ hanging plant shelf ] 

We found another lovely short and easy project from the clever folks at A Beautiful Mess. 

With the popularity of hanging plants, and macrame holders, we thought this hanging plant shelf would be another great make. 

You only need a staple gun, thin rope/string and some kind of wooden plate – a circle of wood cut at a local wood store, a top of a stool, a wooden plate or even a chopping board.

This simple tutorial from A Beautiful Mess will guide you through this easy project. The hanging shelf would make a great gift, would work well hung in a pair or trio (at different levels) and if you are adept at macrame – it could be combined! 

home: made [ curtain tie backs ] 

home: made [ curtain tie backs ] 

We love this modern, clean design for curtain tie backs spotted on an online interiors group via Pinterest. With the use of the raw wood beads it’s a very Scandinavian look but the beads could be stained, sprayed, painted or patterned to suit your interior look. 

A simple easy project which will need;  strong cord/string or wire for threading beads, wooden beads (available from many outlets including Hobbycraft and eBay, paint, spray or varnish (unless you want to keep the beauty of the natural wood, pliers, and hooks for the wall. 

Thread the wooden beads onto the string or wire to the create a chosen length. The length will depend on how tight you want your curtains to sit back against the wall (smaller the length, the tighter the curtain will bunch up). Create a loop on each end of the wire/string to be able to simply loop onto your wall mounted hooks. Think about ensuring the wall hooks sit well against or match the beads well. 

This would work well for heavy weight curtains or billowing thin voile curtains too. 

home: made [ plant pots and plant stands ] 

home: made [ plant pots and plant stands ] 

January is all about new projects and hiding from the cold, and making crafty projects. 

Introduce some indoor (or outdoor) gardening to your home but instead of just buying planters and pots – look to use, upcycle, recycle and make your own alternative containers and stands for your planting. 


There’s great tutorials from favourites A Beautiful Mess and Brit & Co but there’s lots of easy projects without tutorials. 

Search for unusual containers – cups, buckets, tins, old crates, bags or even tea pots. Depending on what you choose to plant your chosen container may need to have drainage holes. Then you can think about creativity with paints, sprays, varnishes or if the item has vintage charm it might look great as it is. 

Look at trends in colour and pattern for inspiration and use masking to create designs on the outside – try geometric , stripes or colour blocking. Techniques including drip, dip and ombré may be a little more challenging but have great results too. 

Find a collection of great tutorials all grouped together at Cool Crafts 

home: made [ crate shelving ] 

home: made [ crate shelving ] 

Adaptable for any space, size or colour, we love this tutorial we found, for making cool shelving from old vintage wooden crates. 


Wooden crates can be found at vintage fairs, eBay, carboot sales and other vintage selling outlets plus there is now ‘new’ versions that can be bought in plain wood. 

Then you’ll need a drill, screws, wood glue and your choice of stain, varnish or paint. 

Nifty tutorial HERE 

home: made [ midcentury shelving ] 

home: made [ midcentury shelving ] 

The look of floating or modular shelving is minimal and clean with brands like Ladderax and String being the leaders in design; both in the last few decades and in present day. 

We came across a great DIY tutorial from OldBrandNew which is a great way to produce a similar look at a fraction of the price as well as being satisfying that it’s homemade. 


Making your own means you can also customise the size, dimensions and colour yourself with UK based suppliers offering all the equipment you’ll need from adjustable wall system racks from hardware stores including Wickes, BigDug and Screwfix, to high street DIY stores, like B&Q, having a good choice of ready cut wood shelves to use on the system as well as offering a cutting service when you give your own measurements. 

Untreated wooden wood could be finished how you want in round stains, paint or varnish, and wall brackets can be bought in a few different colours or sprayed to the colour you want. 

These systems are always easily changeable, can be added to and even the colour changed at a later date. 

home: made [ towel loops ] 

home: made [ towel loops ] 

With a nod to our favourite style providers, the Scandinavians, these wooden beaded towel holders are simple to make and look great in a bathroom or kitchen. 

This simple tutorial from SpoonForkBacon is easy to follow and can be adapted in size and colour depending on your interior preference. Beads and the leather straps can be ordered online from a craft supplier or there is plenty of choice on eBay, and then you just need a length of pliable wire that is slim enough to fit through the holes in the beads. The wooden beads can be dyed, varnished or stained to which ever colour suits the room. 

This great project could be made large for bath towels, great in a kitchen for a tea towel or other areas in the home could look lovely as a decorative feature. 

home: made [ bleach dyeing ] 

home: made [ bleach dyeing ] 

Tie dying had a recent serge in popularity with it becoming a strong trend in fabric last year but it’s just one part of the joys of pattern-creating with bleach. 

Modern bleaching producing Scandinavian influenced designs

Bleach is an easy, when used safely, substance to use to create your own printed-style fabric in many variations. 

Using brushes, sprays, knot tying, stencils and other tools, you can create so many different effects that result in incredibly beautiful fabrics. This DIY creative process is great to be able to create fabrics to match colour schemes, styles and patterns in your home. The fabrics can be used for further DIY projects including cushion making, upholstery and making other soft furnishings. 

Modern bleach dyeing project from A Beautiful Mess

Two great features that cover all the aspects and great guidance for creating modern bleached fabric are from A Beautiful Mess and Threads Magazine. Both show inventive stylish results from using bleach dyeing. 

home: made [ scandi wall hanging ] 

home: made [ Scandi wall hanging ] 

Current trends mean there are many wall hangings to choose from from stores but to be able to make your own means you can colour match your room and size. 

We love A Beautiful Mess and they’ve come up with this super simple tutorial to make a gorgeous Scandi style hanging.

With a few materials, it’s a simple project with great results. 

Click here to start making your now 

home: made [ bedside tables ] 

home: made [ bedside tables ] 

Whether you’re handy enough to build a DIY table or can just get hold of random objects, there are numerous ideas to use to create unique simple structures that can act as a stylish beside table. 

There are tutorials to build simple structures but also it’s about using other pieces of furniture or structures that can have an alternative use as a bedside unit. Try hunting for wooden crates, mini step ladders, floating shelves or an upturned steel bucket or bin.

For the simplest idea try using a stool as a table. It’s just the right height to be perfect beside a bed and there’s so much choice to match a interior styling theme – wood, copper, cork etc and can of course be painted to suit the colour palette. It’s a cheap option when a stool could be picked up for low prices from high street stores including IKEA and Dunelm or hunt through carboot sales, charity furniture shops or vintage fairs for bargains that can be used in their rustic or industrial state or upcycled with paint, fabric or even decoupage. 

Crates are great as a ready made cube to both offer storage inside and a flat surface on the top. Add caster wheels or screw in legs to add an extra level to the design. Ensure the condition of the crate with smoothing down any rough edges, and waxing, varnishing or painting. 

Stacked items can also form bedside units – try bricks, concrete blocks, vintage cases, glass bricks or even bottle crates. The simplest item stacked as they are or topped with a simple square of wood or a large tile can be an easy way to produce a unique surface and a cool piece for a bedroom. 

Keep your eyes pealed for bargains that can be turned into pieces of furniture and follow on Pinterest for inspiration. 

1 Adding wheels to an upturned crate 

2 Follow tutorials for guidance to make unique furniture

3 On-trend concrete – easily used in the home 

4 Stacking vintage suitcase – great storage and a solid surface. Hunt eBay and vintage fairs. 

5 Simply stack books or magazines and top with a square of wood or glass or simply one larger hard back book

6 Quirky idea to use a suspended swing shelf as a bedside table 

7 Gorgeous cork SINNERLIG stool from IKEA £50 

8 Try Etsy, EBay or Not On The High Street for crates or take your time hunting antiques and vintage fairs. 

9 Crates when stacked, create simple shelving