Free Cabinet Makeover - Livin' Real with Larissa

After spending months looking for something to suit my family room remodel and needs, it found me. This cabinet, a FREE cabinet, jumped into my day. eep!

Now, as you know, and as I’ve demonstrated, free doesn’t really mean free (as in no work). But what good is getting exactly what you need and want without a little sweat equity, eh?

If you look closely, you see one door is missing glass, and one drawer is in need of repair.

But otherwise, this is a solid piece and is – first come, first served.

THE STORY

While working on my last post, my arched hollow core door tutorial, I had a buyer come to purchase an item from me. After the item sold, I hopped online to change the listing status.

While doing so, I had this free cabinet come into my feed.

I stopped in my scroll.

Unbelievable to me, it was still available after shortly being listed. I inquire and figure it’s already gone.

However, the sweet couple listing it replied about an hour later saying that the first one to respond to chat would get it.

double eep!!

After instantly texting back that I’m on my way, my daughter and I hustle over.

Much to my chagrin, I get there and IT’S TOO BIG for my car.

My daughter and I haul it back up the driveway and it is HEAVY.

Then, I have an idea.

I ask if it’s alright if I run home and grab my tools so I can take it apart to fit in my vehicle.

The owner, Miss M comes out and tells me that she has no problem with that, but I better be back quickly because another person already tried to take it before I got there and I got there in less than 10 minutes!

I remove the drawers, doors, and shelves to take with me while I run home.

Thankfully, my daughter, Miss E, agrees to this entire crazy journey.

In thirty minutes, I had that thing beat apart, loaded up, and back home.

How’s that for DIY?

mwahahahaha…

But maybe the jokes on me?

BUILD IT

Per my usual, my goal is to inspire you. Maybe you have that misfit piece that functions but needs an update.

Or maybe you need to find something to function in your home, like me.

For the record, I really wanted slim bookcases without doors. So… I’m curious if this will suit my needs as it seems deeper than I’d prefer and really don’t want to deal with glass doors. But… there’s plenty of space in it and I think I can make it my own.

First, I bring in the pieces inside because in my garage is a balmy 101° with 95% humidity. whew!

Since this was put together with staples, I have to pull all those out first. This piece is made of mostly fabricated wood but does have oak crosspieces as well as oak door frames.

Then, after a rough layout of all the pieces, I begin by assembling the bottom first. My vlog below shows this…fun… best.

Once the base is together, I stand it up to finish top portion.

As you can see in my vlog below, doing all this didn’t just pop together. haha.

My focus is to keep everything square because if I don’t, the drawers won’t fit and the doors won’t hang properly. Rolling in that drawer with ease made everything feel like it’s falling into place… literally.

My vlog below covers even more details of this whole story. View it below.

As you can see in the vlog, I make an executive decision to change the style with removing the crown molding.

With that, I need to build in a framework so I can have a functional top surface.

Before I can put the final touches on this free cabinet, I need to add a different style. I pull out a set of three remnant Art Deco drawer pulls that I save from a previous waterfall chest of drawers. However, I need a total of four.

So that means I need to create a match.

It’s not perfect, but it works for me.

FINISHING

Finally, after much sweat equity (literally) and elbow grease, here’s my free cabinet with a modern makeover.

While the lights in my family room are turned to a soft yellow, the paint I used on this piece is called tea time – a very soft beige. I’m loving the soothing vibe it has and plays well with the color of my recent DIY accent wall.

I did debate on making the backing or maybe the side panels a different color, or shaded, or…? What would you have done?

Likewise, I want to see how I feel about the depth of it for a time before fulling filling it. It does block my wall furnace a bit and was more wanting several bookshelves without doors.

But I do love it.

Even my lavender I planted in my backyard makeover is blooming beautifully and smells AMAZING.

Oh, and can you tell which pull is the one I made by hand? {{wink, wink}}

Now it’s your turn… would you have (1) beaten this apart to get it in your car? (2) would you have kept the crown moulding? (3) would you have kept the distressed black or…?