The Almost-Finished Built-Ins

It really bugs me when projects in my house are "almost finished." And these built-ins have been "almost finished" since the end of July. Then I was torn away from them by multiple other projects. And the reality is that I may not be able to get back to them until January. They still need a few various pieces of trim, some sanding, some filling, and a few coats of paint in a few spots.

But ohmygosh, I love them. The base cabinets came from the ReStore. The one on the left cost a dollar. It was in bad shape. The middle one and the one on the right cost $20 each. They were in good shape and are solid oak. The one on the left camouflages one of those weird bump-outs in a wall that is so typical of basements. The bump-out is for the drain pipe from our kitchen sink and dishwasher above that corner of the basement. In order to make the built-ins flush all across the front, I bumped out the middle and the right ones to match the depth of the one on the left and I built the shelves above at different depths to accommodate the bump out, too.

Sounds confusing, I know. It was confusing. It took a lot of staring and tilting my head and scratching notes on paper and deep thought to figure it out. To add to the confusion, the wall that the cabinets are on curves outward as it goes up toward the ceiling, so the wall had to be furred out to get the cabinets to sit right. I'm going to be totally honest here, it was HARD. But the result is (or will be) exactly what I was hoping for. A little reading nook (with puck lights installed in the shelf above, thank you Scott!) and built-in cabinets to house sheets and towels. The cabinet on the right even has three electrical outlets and pull-out shelves to give guests a place to store and charge their computers, e-readers, phones, etc.

Yeah, I know. So stinking awesome.

I'll post more photos when the unit is totally done. So, maybe sometime in 2018.

Psst...they're finally finished, and it's only 2012! Check out the whole basement here.