Materials: Billy shelves

Description: I searched high and low for affordable benches, cabinets, baskets, etc to make a mudroom for our 3 little boys and their stuff. Most regular storage benches were too high for their short little legs. And Pottery Barn and similar things were 3 times the price.

I knew I could find something to make a square mudroom with hooks in the middle from something at Ikea. But it did take a bit of time to figure it out.

I used the skinny white Billy bookcases for the shelves and put the Billy cabinet doors on the bottom. I connected them on top with the Billy wall shelf and also used the wall shelf on the bottom as a bench. The wall shelf is the perfect height for kids as a bench and the exact width I needed to make a perfect square. I used Leksvik hooks in the middle for coats.

Ikea doesn't advertise a mudroom, but they should. This combination worked perfectly for us.

~ Kristin, Malvern, PA USA

Materials: Billy Bookshelves, Benno DVD Tower

Description: Billy has corner bookshelves combo. However it doesn't fit in my root neatly.

So what I did is to use Benno DVD tower as corner shelf. Billy corner hardware can be used as is.

I also put on height extension. However, Benno DVD tower doesn't have height extension. I have to use 15 3/4" Billy height extension and cut narrower. Benno tower is also shallower then Billy. So I have to use the left over of back board to fill up the rear bottom half of the narrowed Billy (now Benno) height extension.

It looks great and fit in my room perfectly.

~ Henry, USA

Materials: Billy, Billy Morebo, LILLANGEN, Capita, ANNO STRA

Description:
We have a very small bathroom (barely 4,5 square meters) and where sick of looking at the old plastic-and-glass thing that held our towels. So we went out to Ikea to get some ideas.

First we introduced a new carpet matching the tiling. Than we looked for a replacement for the ugly glass rack. The space is really tight and has the connectors for a washing machine in the middle, we needed some way around that.


We settled for a 40x106cm Billy shelf with a Billy Morebo door to keep out the dust.

We found two Lillangen top opening wall cabinets that would fit neatly over the door, so we bought them as well.



We have a big rattan clothes basket and wanted to make the door look in the kind of same look. The Anno Stra curtain was the closest thing we could find, so we fitted it inside the Morebo door.

To get some more space that would be accessible from the bathtub we mounted 4 Capita legs up the Billy shelf and glued a glass plate from the old rack on top.

So here are the results. We are really happy this turned out, our small bath has suddenly a lot of space.

~ Tarwin, Munich, Germany

Materials: Billy, Besta, Tombo doors, Grundtal rails, brackets and hinges from hardware store

Description: In our 1903 apartment we were facing the typical problem of an ugly surface-mounted fuse box that we wanted to hide. As the ceiling is quite high, we couldn't find a piece furniture tall enough. So we took a Billy bookcase (79 1/2", 202 cm tall) and fixed it to the wall with metal brackets.


The fuse box is now hidden behind a Tombo door. All the extra wiring for the wifi-hardware is behind the door we built from one of the Billy shelves that we didn't need anymore.


To complete the wardrobe and get space for all our winter gear and helmets we hung a Besta shelf-unit/height extension (47 1/4", 120 cm wide) next the Billy, also with Tombo doors. The Besta had to be turned upside down because of the holes for the feet. The rod is made of two Grundtal rails. The Trones shoe storage makes the all-white wardrobe perfect. Unfortunately IKEA has discontinued the white Trones.


~ Jochen and Edith, Germany

Materials: Tobo, Billy

Description: We got a new 37" flatscreen TV but I couldn't find anything that would suit for the base unit.


Our apartment is not the biggest and space is always at a premium so we needed something on wheels that would take up as little space as possible whilst containing the TV, the HTPC and all the junk.

By combining a Tobo, a bit of some Billy shelving some castors and some pine board we ended up with a nice unit that has lots of storage and is easy to move into position for movie nights but pushes up against the wall when we want more space.


See more of the Tobo-Billy TV unit.

~ Matt Casey, Barcelona

Materials: Billy bookshelves, Besta Jagra

Description: I wanted an entertainment centre to fit our new, bigger TV, plus some much needed storage space. Shopping around only revealed that getting something the size I wanted would end up costing $3000 and up.

I have a six year old son who owns the house with his toys, so the TV room was more like his play room. I wanted to ensure that his toys stayed in the same place, but hidden.

Initially, I thought about buying a couple of Pax wardrobes and cutting half the doors to fit the TV, but the TV size did not flow with the Paxes. After browsing IKEA for a day, I settled on the Billy bookshelves and a Besta Jagra, all of these in black-brown... but I still had no storage room for the toys.

Then I stumbled across this site. It inspired me, and I got the idea to simply buy two smaller "Billys" (1/2 the size of the big ones), adding some doors to the smaller ones, not installing the backer board and shelves in the small ones, and fusing these smaller Billys to the big ones, to create the extra space.


I used some pieces of MDF painted black, and some screws to hold the thing in place and make it easy to take apart if needed and the result looks great (in my opinion, of course).

Hope you guys like it!

~ Daniel, Nemarket, Ontario, Canada

Materials:
From Ikea: Billy bookcase, Billy Height extension, 2 Faktum base cabninets 40cm wide, Faktum wall cabinet (40 x 92cm).
Other stuff: Plasterboard, wooden slats, monitor arm and wallpaper (Cole & Son Wood).

Description: We needed to add some extra storage space in the our living room and we were looking for a cabinet that would blend in. We came up with the idea to make a cabinet at the head of the table. First we thought to make the cabinet entirely from MDF, but we also wanted the wallpaper that we have in our kitchen to repeat somewhere in the living room. Wallpaper on the side of a thin plate of MDF didn't feel right and for that reason the side of the cabinet had to have a more "wall like" appearance.


Finally we came up with this solution. We stacked up 3 Faktum cabinets (for hidden storage) on one side and a Billy bookcase with height extension (for books) on the other. Both sides with their backs to each other. Both Billy and Faktum have a width of 40cm. In front of the Ikea storage heap we constructed a frame of wooden slats, which in turn was covered with plasterboard. We took 36 mm slats and 12.5 mm plasterboard. This results in a "wall" of approx 5cm. After plastering the bumps we gave this "wall" a wallpaper finish.


Finally we mounted our monitor on the wall with a monitor arm that can fold back completely. This way we have a working space on the table that can easily be pushed aside or made into a interactive picture frame for a diner with friends.

The only thing missing now is a nice colorful fake bird on the wall. A new table project will be next.

~ Roel, Netherlands

Materials: Half Height Billy Bookcases

Description: I love built-ins, I can't afford built-ins so I made my own out of 5 Billy bookcases.
Step 1) Assemble bookcases! Easier said then done.
Step 2) Screw bookcases together, pulling the middle section out 3-4 inches. Creating some interest!


Step 3) Cut MDF into three sections, glue and nail to top
Step 4) Attach chair rail or crown molding to the face (a chair rail is much easier to work with than crown)


Step 5) Fill seams and gaps. Once dry sand
Step 6) Paint, we chose Martha Stewart's Talc color to match the white Billy bookcases, not an exact match but pretty darn close.


See more of the Billy built-in with a top.

~ Ashli c/o Maillardville Manor, Vancouver, BC

Materials: Billy Wall Shelf

Description: I loved the floating Billys, but for our apartment we needed a horizontal line, not vertical one.

The Billy Planner let us conceive of lots of different options, but we ultimately settled on this.

It is made entirely of Billy wall shelves which are typically used with the Billy book cases, but we used them alone.

The open space between each is equal to one Billy wall shelf for 3 reasons. 1. Aesthetics; 2. Ease of installation (I could use a spare Billy Wall Shelf as spacer), 3. It allows me to fill in with new Billys if I get more books. Once I set the bottom one at right height, it was easy to build it up.


Note that the side walls of Billy Wall shelves extend a little above the top horizontal and bottom horizontal which creates a space between the units. I was going to shave them down first, but figured I'd %*#(@ everything up, so then I thought I'd add trim after the fact, but ultimately, it didn't bother me.

I did lay a piece of painted wood over bottom unit to give more finished look.

~ DJ, Harlem, NYC

Materials: Billy bookcase, wrapping paper, mod podge

Description: I've posted all the instructions and step by step photos here.

See more of Sharon's Billy bookcase

~ Sharon Pakir, Melbourne, Australia

Materials: Billy bookshelf

Description: When I moved in here I hade several old Billy shelves in a dark reddish colour that didn't match the new place. I also needed more shelves than I had for all my books.

With some help I dismantled the shelves, and sawed away the part where the backside is. Doing this shelves and sides got the same depth. Also painted them white.

We then screwed the sides to the wall and added the shelves, to get more parts I bought Billy tops. Some of the shelves are placed using the old holes, other are screwed into place.

All that is missing is a list at the top to make it look built in.

~ Jessica, Sundsvall, Sweden

Materials: Billy, molding, wallpaper, paint

Description: A ten year old Billy, boring but still going strong got another ten years of glamor filled life by being turned into a built-in.


By adding mdf and crown molding the bookcase was extended up to the ceiling.


More molding was used to decorate the edges and make 'fake' supports.


Beadboard wallpaper gives the impression of a real beadboard back.


White paint ties it all in.

Full tutorial for the Billy built in.

~ Marianne@Songbird, Netherlands

Materials: Billy bookcase, some shelves, hinges, ...

Description: The cage of our rats became too small and we had problems with the old cage because of litter falling all the time. So I reused a Billy bookcase (because I bought a new bookcase) and I separate it into three parts: one part storage, one part for our young rats and a part for our adult rats.


I bought some shelves and put an edge of 5 cm attached with dowels to prevent the litter from falling. Finally I painted everything.



For the doors, I assembled boards with dowels and wood glue and I put the grate recovered from the old cage.

~ Laura V, Liège (Belgium)