I’ve been on the hunt for months for something I could use in my dining room for a liquor cabinet. I entertain a lot, so I usually have a pretty decent stash of adult beverage supplies on hand, and none of my kitchen cabinet shelves are tall enough to accommodate the height of the bottles.
First world problems, I know.
I’ve been looking for something vintage, chippy and interesting looking and coming up completely empty. The space I’m working with is only about 3′ wide, so between the restrictions on the width and needing tall or adjustable shelves, I’m pretty much searching for the elusive unicorn – so I decided to make a temporary solution out of a ReStore kitchen cabinet.
This is what I started with:
The 70’s orange stain matched Donald Trump’s spray tan and sported a thick coat of grease with graffiti accents on the top:
Which is pretty weird, because this is an UPPER cabinet – in theory, the top of this would have been near the ceiling somewhere…..right?
I started out by scrubbing the whole piece down with a strong Pine Sol solution to get rid of the dirt and grease, then I went over it with a deglosser.
I added wooden feet from Lowe’s:
My original plan was to find or make some kind of wooden top, but one night I started playing around with the space on the top of the cabinet and discovered that it was the perfect size to hold wine corks:
Not surprisingly, I have a pretty big stash – so I was glad to find a creative use for them.
I didn’t have a clear picture of what I wanted this piece to look like, so I started experimenting with the 3 colors of leftover paint that I have used throughout my house. I gave it one coat of the darkest color, then dry brushed on the 2 lighter colors, and this is what I ended up with:
I spray painted the old hinges oil rubbed bronze and added a set of pulls from Hobby Lobby:
For the top, I dug out a glass coffee table top I had stashed in my attic and had my local glass shop cut it down to size to cover the corks.
The adjustable shelves work perfectly for booze:
NOTE: The doors on this cabinet are solid wood and kind of heavy, plus the wooden feet are not mounted right on the edge, so it was a little tippy. To avoid a sticky, booze-soaked catastrophe we attached the cabinet to the wall.
The cabinet tucks perfectly into the little corner next to the French doors that lead to my deck and pergola.
I am not in love with this piece, but it’s a perfect transition until I find my elusive vintage-chippy-thrifted unicorn with tall shelves.
This was the price breakdown:
- ReStore cabinet: $35
- 4 wooden feet: $24
- Glass: $10 to cut down an existing piece
- Knobs: $5
I had the corks and the paint, so they were free. If you could find someone getting rid of their cabinets, you could probably make a DIY liquor cabinet for even less.
Lower kitchen cabinets are so deep that they are tough to use anywhere else, but the uppers are a more manageable size, and I think they have all kinds of potential for other storage projects – kid’s rooms, craft areas, home offices, etc. The ReStore in my area charges a flat price per cabinet regardless of how big it is, so large doubles are the same price as a single – you’ll want to dig around to get the most bang for your buck.
I had my family over for a cookout last night, so we have officially broken in the new home for the booze. 😆
I’m linking this project up at some terrific blog parties – you can find my complete list of places I party HERE.
