DIY floating bathroom shelves

 

My biggest complaint about our house is the lack of storage. As we redid our upstairs bathrooms and master closet I was determined to get some more storage space while making it look pleasing.

In our master bathroom we expanded into our master closet to make our shower bigger. With a 60" shower we had roughly 2 ft of left over space that we framed out and made a small inset on both sides (the closet and the bathroom) 

Now we could've gone and bought the white wire shelves and just cut them to the correct size and put them up. But I absolutely hate those! I have taken so many down over the years. I find they are huge grime and dust collectors, they don't actually hold that much stuff and they are just an eyesore. I was determined to do something more functional and attractive. 

Amongst my many pinterest searches I found people creating wooden floating shelves in pantries and other closets and I really liked the look of it. 

Materials List 

- 1X2 boards- the amount you need is dependent on the size of your shelves and the amount of shelves

-1X3 boards- again amount determined by the size of the shelves 

- 3/4 inch plywood. You could probably get away with half inch but we wanted to make sure they were sturdy. We don't plan on putting a ton of weight on them but just incase. 

- Stain of your choice, polyurethane 

-Screws/ drywall anchors depending on your options, brad nails

Tool List 

-Table or skill saw- table saw makes it easier but it is very doable with a skill saw 

- Drill 

-Stud Finder 

-Nail Gun

Step 1: Finding Studs and Measuring 1X2s 

We determined that we wanted 3 shelves in our bathroom and 4 shelves in our closet. Both sets of shelves started roughly 2.5-3ft off the ground because we have a towel warmer that we wanted to sit below the shelves in the bathroom and a specific laundry basket that sits below the closet shelves. Max went through and marked out all the studs- this was pretty easy because we had framed this wall and had preplanned for these shelves. If for some reason you don't find at least two studs to anchor the shelves you'd want to get drywall anchors. 

From there we measured and cut the 1X2 board. These frame the edges for the 3/4" plywood board to sit on. You want to have the 1X2 braces on either side of the shelf. This was not possible for us in the closet because there was a pocket door on one of the walls- we couldn't anchor into a moving door. To make this more secure we anchored into the back wall instead. Also we knew that only clothes were going on these so it would never have a super heavy load. 

We predrilled all of the holes before screwing them into the wall 

Step 2 Cutting and staining the plywood. 

So it just so happened that we had a bunch of 3/4" plywood laying around our garage. The previous owners had installed these basic plywood shelves in our garage that I absolutely hated (shocker, I know). The shelves didn't really hold that much and they were way too high that you would have to get on a step ladder to put anything up there any my husband is just going to put it on the floor instead. They were literally just collecting dust. So I had my husband take them all off the walls. They were so dirty from years of neglect that I literally sprayed them off with the hose and let them dry out in the sun for a day. After that I sanded the boards with 100 grit just to get the rest of the years of dirt and grime off. From there we cut them to the sizes that we needed using our neighbors table saw (we have since bought our own because we borrowed theirs so often). 

If you don't have 3/4" plywood screwed into the walls of your garage serving no real purpose then you can find some at any hardware store. They typically sell it in 4X8 ft panels or  2X4 ft panels. Depending on what type of vehicle you have access to and the size of your shelves I would recommend the 2x4ft panels. Also keep in mind the big sheets of these are heavy! 

After they were cut I stained them using Jacobean from Minwax stains. I also put two coats of polyurethane because I knew the shelves in the bathroom would be exposed to a lot of moisture over the years. I was shocked at the transformation that the stain gave them. You would never know that they were beat up pieces of plywood that had been living in my garage. 

While I didn't stain the edges of the plywood I made sure to stain both sides of it. I've seen pictures were people only stain the top of the boards and you can see the unfinished side on the top shelves and it looks so terrible. When in doubt- stain it. 

You can see in this picture on the right I have one shelf fully stained and the other 1/2 way stained and it makes such a difference compared to the unstained ones on the left side. I loved how the stained really brought out the grain of the wood! You can also see that I stained all the 1x2s and 1x3s at the same time. 

Step 3: Applying the plywood to the 1X2 braces. 

After installing the 1X2s we laid the plywood on top and used a nail gun to nail the plywood into the 1x2s. This was pretty easy. I put stainable wood filler in the nail holes as I went along. 

Step 4- Apply a 1X3 to the front of each shelf. 

To cover up the joining of the 1x2 to the plywood we nailed a stained 1x3 to the front of each shelf. I feel this really gave it a finished look and if you look at it straight on the shelves appear to be floating.  

Overall 

Overall I am super pleased with how this project turned out! Because we already had the plywood this was a very inexpensive project for us. We also were able to use up some left over 1X2s and 1X3s that we had in our garage from other projects. I love the look of the shelves and they bring a lot of needed storage for us! This was an easy project for us- the most time consuming part is waiting for the stain and polyurethane to dry!