lisa sent me a link to moddi murphybed as she was wondering whether anyone out there has built one and if it was any good. so, if you have, please comment away!
for $7.95 you get a set of moddi murphybed building instructions that lets you build a hideaway bed for less than $275. way cheaper than the original murphy bed.
now, why it earns a spot on this blog is simply that the moddi uses ikea! you'll need a lillehammer bed frame, 8 lack side tables and a sultan lade slatted bed base besides a whole plethora of hardware, nuts and blots to make a twin moddi murphybed. more if you're cranking out a double.
i was really hoping to get a good look at the whole contraption but their gallery is down for now. bummer. anyways i managed to find these 2 photos on the site and it does look like a fabulous solution for small spaces. it may not be all that easy to build though.
do you have a moddi murphybed? let us know if it works for you.
it was a tough fight but in the end, the tortoise turtle really did outrun the others. little did i expect the last minute inclusion of the turtle terrarium would seal its fate as the ikea hack of 2007. the terrarium, marcus winter's far out tv unit conversion, took home 16% of 1422 readers' votes.
on their own, they are nothing fabulous but this is where the phrase 'the sum of its parts is greater than its whole' really comes true. a couple of well-placed ikea hacks transform joe kelly jr's basement into a fabulous car room.
joe tells me, "i have a model car collection in my basement, and i wanted to build in some display space, add a couple pieces of 'utility' furniture, and do it on the cheap.
first was the display cabinets against the wall. i used billy cases, but i had to shorten them to fit into the space i was intending to use. i also added a slew of new shelf-mounting holes (man, talk about math! getting the new holes into the 'rhythm' of the old ones wasn't easy). i tossed the backing that came with the cabinets, and installed corrugated steel (just like the stuff used throughout the rest of the room). i glued and screwed the sections together and mounted them into the wall space. then i added a combination of halogen and fluorescent lighting.
second was the table/support for the glass case in the center of the room. i used an ikea sofa table, added in an additional shelf, boxed the legs with ikea shelves cut to size, then ran wire under the floor and added an electrical outlet underneath, for the built-in slot car track power supply. i secured the glass display case for more models above it all.
the reason i have a slot car power supply is that the ceiling lowers down, revealing a slot car track. i built that, too, but it wouldn't have worked if not for the twin ikea coffee tables i bashed together at the front of the room. i used two square tables (silver and black) which i cut to size, doweled and glued together, and attached to a sturdy plywood base with casters. i topped the table with rubber floor matting. this table does double duty; when the track is up, it's a coffee table. when i want to lower the track, i stand the table on end, and it supports the forward section of the platform.
there's a couple of ways to see it. one is to go to my web site: another is to watch the 'Look What I Did' segment below."
was meaning to post this earlier in the day but am having lots of trouble with my internet connection. anyways, this post made it for bathroom day and it's worth the wait.
clever, clever use of the stolmen chest! david m turns it into a wall mounted vanity. perfect for small bathrooms.
david m writes, "i made a vanity out of the ikea stolmen chest with 2 drawers. i wall mounted it and modified it for use as a vanity like this one only for $50 instead of $1500. i found the sink and faucet at grassroots modern.
of course, there's a drain and p-trap coming down from the sink and going back to the wall. in order to make the drawers functional, i had to shorten them. this wasn't particularly difficult - cut the drawer base to the desired depth, cut a groove to receive the drawer back, drill 4 holes to attach the drawer back with the original plastic ikea hardware. works just like it did before only the drawers are a little less than half as deep. it's a lot better than nothing, though, and my wife uses the top drawer as countertop space when she's getting ready in the morning because our vanity is so small.
wall-mounting the vanity turned out to be easier than i thought. i took a 4' section of 1.5" angle stock from home depot, cut 2 pieces of about 19", bolted it with some pretty heavy bolts to the studs in the wall, drilled a couple holes on top of the new vanity at the back to correspond with the holes in the angle stock and bolted the vanity to the bracket. i then bolted up a second bracket to the wall inside the vanity at the bottom and bolted the vanity to that. from there, i cut a hole in the top of the vanity for the faucet and another for the drain, mounted the sink and faucet and that was it."
thought of doing a bathroom day! so i'll be posting two hacks for the busiest room in the house. the first is from karen in san francisco who madeover her bathroom and hacked this cute sink. the second one will be posted later today.
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"we redid our entire bathroom, and in the process, wanted to get a bowl sink on top of a dark wood table. the table we wanted was $900!!! so i decided to make my own.
i bought the bekvam kitchen cart for $49.99. before assembling, i cut the hole in the top with a sabre saw per the sink installation instructions. i wasn't going to put the wheels on, and i sawed off the back two legs so they would be the same length as the now non-wheelies ones. i stained all of the parts with a dark walnut stain.
when dry, i assembled the table without the middle shelf. i put 3 coats of clear satin waterproof stain on it since it's in a high moisture area. i put the sink on top, caulked around it, attached a drain pipe, and had a plumber install wall faucets. groovy! and a heckluva lot cheaper than $900!
the sink and faucet are from Expo Home Design Center."
rudi and melanie found a bright solution for storage in their tiny alcove.
"we have a very small alcove (95cm/37.5") in our corridor. but most closets are 100cm. so we built a closet with chipboards and used an ikea pax vikedal mirror door over it. on the left door (which is built from mdf), we mounted 3 ikea stamning lights. the lights are connected to a wiring closet so they can turn on with a normal light switch."
diane turned this bench (the name, anyone?), salvaged from the trash, into a little piece of art.
she first transferred the design, taken from an Art Nouveau book that she had and drew it on the bench with white colored pencil. then, she coloured it in with acrylics.
do you have a moddi murphybed? let us know if it works for you.
