Repurposed Kitchen Cabinets

When Rob and I started our kitchen/living room renovation a few months ago, we were trying to come up with ways to organize the rest of our space (primarily the garage and basement). Instead of putting our kitchen cabinets by the road, we decided to re-use them in our basement so we could have more storage in the basement and to free up space in our garage. I'm really happy with how this little project

BEFORE:

We are trying to overhaul, purge, and organize everything in our house, garage and yard at the moment and that includes Rob's fishing and boating gear. Our goal for our garage is for it to become our workshop for woodworking so we want everything else out!

SUPPLIES:

-3 pieces of 1x3x10' pine boards

-Tapcon concrete anchors (3/16"x1-3/4")

-Tapcon drill bit (5/32" x 3-1/2")

-phillips head screw bit

-1" Grip Rite drywall screws

-60v DeWALT drill

-measuring tape

-pencil

STEP 1: Measure cabinets

Before starting this project, Rob made sure to remove all remaining trim nails that were attached to the tops of the cabinets from where the crown molding had once been attached.

Then, he measured the width of the cabinets together to figure how long the pine strips to mount them on needed to be. He came up with 66".

STEP 2: Mark and cut

Next, he measured and marked the pine strips and cut them all at the same time with a chop saw. If you don't have power tools, you can cut the wood manually or ask an associate at the hardware store to cut them wherever you purchase the wood from.

STEP 3: Level and attach pine strips

PART I: After he had his 3 pine strips cut, Rob drilled and screwed in the left side of the top strip to the wall where we knew we wanted the tops of our cabinets to go. Then, he used a level to make the pine strip straight and marked the right side.

PART II: Once the pine strip was level, he drilled and screwed the middle and right side of the pine strip. *Make sure to use the hammer setting of your drill for drilling and the screw setting for screwing.

STEP 4: Measure height of cabinets

We had two different heights of cabinets so once the first pine strip was attached to the wall, Rob needed to measure the height of the shorter cabinet we were mounting to know where to screw it in to the wall so that it was secure (the bottom of the shorter cabinet would be mounted to the second pine strip that would be attached to the wall).

Rob took the measurement of the height of the shorter cabinet, then measured from the top of the first pine strip and marked the wall where the bottom of the shorter cabinet would go. This is where he attached the second pine strip; he repeated STEP 3 PART II for this.

Now that he had 2 of the 3 pine strips attached to the wall, it was time to attach the third. Before he could do that though, he had to measure the height of the taller cabinets to figure where the third pine strip would need to be attached.

Rob took the measurement he got from the height of the taller cabinets, measured from the top of the first pine strip on the wall and marked where the third pine strip would be attached.

Here is what the 3 pine strips looked like before we mounted the cabinets. You'll definitely want to lay out where you want you'll cabinets before starting any of these steps. It will make your life a lot easier and this project a lot quicker.

STEP 5: Mount cabinets

Finally, it was time to mount the cabinets to the wall. First, Rob pre-drilled 2 screws into the top lip of the cabinets (he used the same holes that were already made from when they were mounted in the kitchen). Then, he lined up the top of the cabinet with the top of the first pine strip and drove those same 2 screws into the pine strips. He also drilled 2 screws towards the bottom of the cabinet to secure the cabinets into the third pine strip. He repeated this step for the remaining cabinets.

Here are the cabinets all mounted on the basement wall! There was a big piece of the third pine strip exposed and we thought about putting little screw hooks in them for hanging things but Rob decided to move all of his fishing and boating gear (including the shelves from the garage) into the basement and store in and under the cabinets so we weren't able to use the exposed strip of pine for hanging.

I'm so happy that we were able to re-use some of our kitchen cabinets--it makes a world of difference having more space to organize our stuff! We were able to store all of our fishing and boating things, my laundry soaps, and several of my paints/spray paints up and out of reach of Bo.

Happy wife, happy life, right? Well now that we are on the road to less mess and clutter, and more organization, I am ONE. HAPPY. WIFE!                                                                           
Suggested materials

• 3 pieces of 1x3x10' pine boards  (Home Depot)
• Tapcon concrete anchors (3/16"x1-3/4")  (Home Depot)
• Tapcon drill bit (5/32" x 3-1/2")  (Home Depot)
• Phillips head screw bit  (on hand)
• 1" Grip Rite drywall screws  (Home Depot)
• 60v DeWALT drill  (on hand)
• Measuring tape  (on hand)
• Pencil  (on hand)