Who says doing the dishes has to be boring? An old cutting board, over 50 pencil stubs, and some serious ingenuity brought together this DIY dish drainer. With the right tools, you could make your own faster than you might expect.
Related: How to Make a DIY Pencil Dish Rack
To build this doghouse you need same skills that it takes to construct a conventional one—it only looks more complicated. The man behind Homemade Modern, Ben Uyeda, made this stylish pet bed almost entirely out of plywood.
Related: 10 Luxurious Doghouses for Your Pampered Pet
With do-it-yourselfers having spent the last few years on a repurposing binge, it was only a matter of time before they rediscovered cinder blocks, perhaps the grandaddy of all utilitarian, versatile, and readily available building materials. Here, plywood and cinder blocks combine to make shelving of beautiful simplicity.
Related: 8 Great DIY Ways to Use Cinder Blocks
Emily Henderson, a veritable titan of the DIY sphere, showed how excruciatingly easy it can be to build an end table with svelte, modern lines and subdued, refined style. Though furniture stores sell similarly industrial chic pieces for hundreds of dollars, you can make your own for double-digit dollars.
Related: 7 Things You Can Make with Copper Pipes—Easily!
Time to ditch the boring brackets and opt for a simple but sleek look. With just a few strips of leather and a piece of wood, you can make your own shelf in a matter of hours. The best part, all those old leather belts at the bottom of your closet can finally be put to use.
Related: 10 Ways to Use Leather in Your Next Project
Update a plain-Jane mirror for just pennies—literally. Glue coins to the existing frame (or around the perimeter of a frameless mirror), and the variegated copper tones will do the rest of the work to create a luxe statement.
Related: Redecorate Your Home for—and with—Pennies
Move over, staplers, and make room for the liveliest desktop organization: a set of terrariums. Now you can file important paperwork and books between globes of greenery. Glue mason jar lids to the wooden base of a bookend, fill the jars with moss and clippings, then seal it up to sit (and grow) in your office.
Related: 12 Tiny Gardens You Can Grow on a Tabletop
Time and again, we saw that what's old was new again in 2014. And that's never more true than with old kitchen gadgets. Transform an old grater into a pendant light by adding a bulb and cord set—and you're done! To get the ambient light in the photo, use a low-watt or yellow bulb.
Related: Hanging by a Thread - 9 Inventive Ways to Hang Pendant Lights
Antique lovers, this one’s for you. An old wheelchair wheel and stool were repurposed to function as the base of this one-of-a-kind industrial end table. The aged patina of the wheel peeks through the glass table top, adding further vintage charm to the piece.
For more DIY inspiration, try:
10 Surprisingly Simple Woodworking Projects for Beginners
7 Things You Can Make with Copper Pipes—Easily!
15 Shipping Pallet Projects for the DIY Home
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Even if you've got your heart set on hardwood flooring, it's worth considering the alternatives. Sometimes, materials that only look like wood can be just as good as—or even better than—the real thing. Explore your options now!
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