Pallet Shoe Rack #DIY

I own a humble 100-year-old home with a lot of great character, but not a lot of space. My main entrance doesn't have a coat closet, so I leave my shoes either scattered by the front door, or littered throughout the house.

I went to Walmart & Target, but couldn't find an over-sized shoe rack with the kind of character that would fit my small space (essentially the corner between the wall and the door in the picture here), so I decided to make it myself.

Luckily, I still had leftover 2X2's from the end table I made a few weeks ago. I used that, along with pallet wood that I procured through Craigslist for this project.

The only other thing you need is a Kreg Jig. I'm providing a link here for the one that I bought myself on Amazon.

FYI - People are always giving away free pallet wood on CL. I guess that's why there are so many DIY projects with it.



Here's my cut list:
Corner Legs: 4 two by two's - 15 inches long
Elbows: 4 two by two's (2 for each side) - 9 inches long
Horizontal Braces: 3 two by tow's (2 for the back, 1 for the front) - 31 inches long
Pallet for shelving: 7 wood pallet boards - each cut 33.5 inches long (1 cut in half long-ways)

I started by drilling pocket holes on the opposite ends of each piece of wood (with the exception of the corner legs). With some wood glue, kreg screws, and wood clamps, this is what the frame should look like.

I tore apart the wood from a wood pallet and cut 7 slices, each 33.5 inches long. 1 of these slices, I cut in half to cover the bottom frame. You'll see what I mean in the pictures below.

Make sure everything is nice and sanded, so no one gets any splinters.

Now for the fun part - Using wood glue and clamps, I just laid each slice of pallet wood across the top and bottom of the frame. Already, it looks great!

I wrestled with leaving the shoe rack "as is" but in the end, decided to give it a light coat of "Driftwood" colored stain. Here's a close-up after the staining. As you can see, with the 1 pallet slice I cut in half long-ways, I remove an inch from either end to cover the bottom frame.

Here's the show rack after the glue has dried. It's nice and sturdy, and the proportions are exactly what I wanted. It's too small to be a bench (although you could certainly use it as one), but it's big enough to hold all the shoes I have.

I applied three layers of poly to the entire structure (so it would be easy to wipe off the mud from  my shoes, etc.).

Here are picture of the final product! I'm pretty happy with it! 

Thanks for checking out my page! For more stuff I've made, check out my Pinterest page!

http://www.pinterest.com/gotchoi/stuff-i-actually-did/