by There is one TOTALLY complete area in my house, the master bathroom linen closet. I’ve been psyching myself out. The piles of trim and moulding in my basement has had me overwhelmed, so I’ve been avoiding it until this week. If all the trim reinstall goes this smoothly I’ll be the happiest DIYer on the planet.
For those that have not been following the entire journey or if you need a refresher, the linen closet in my master bath was dead space behind walls that was revealed during demo. Thanks to Pinterest I got the brilliant idea to replace this crawl space closet (I have two others that are even bigger) by inserting a dresser into the wall, see inspiration, in my master bedroom. This meant I was able to relocate the door and moulding and use it to create the linen closet in the bathroom. I had to patch the missing floor and frame out a wall to create the space. Check out the picture slideshow at the bottom of Have I Said Lately How Much I LOVE Restoring This House post.
The moulding and shelve brackets from that closet have been sitting in my master floor, with nails still in them waiting to puncture my foot, since December. I thought it would be quick pull them out, use my tried and true Restor-A-Finish clean-up method, and nail them up in new closet. Unfortunately I learned that the new closet was actually wider by 6.5″, so the shelve and moulding would be too short. What to do?????
I started by hanging the shelve brackets. I didn’t concern myself about the gaps on the end of each center bracket because there was still more than enough support for the shelve.
To clean up the brackets, I just used Murphy Oil Soap and water. The moulding I cleaned with the denatured alcohol in preparation for the Restor-A-Finish, but they didn’t look like they needed it. Instead I wiped them down with Howard’s (same company for the Restor-A-Finish) Feed-N-Wax. This company makes an awesome line of products. The Feed-N-Wax worked GREAT, so much so that I used it on the door too as it was in far better condition than other doors I’ve restored. I will most likely do this process (Oil Soap to remove dust and Feed-N-Wax) on more doors in similar condition.
The closet is wider, so I needed to extend the floor moulding center piece and for that I used a piece of the moulding that was on the opening (door) side. I decided to not trim out the inside of the door, which freed up some extra moulding.
To extend the moulding I cut one end of the long piece to a 45 degree angle and glued the 6.5″ extension, also cut at a 45 degree angle to it. I used a product called Insta-Bond, that my carpenter, Tom Milfeld, told me about. I’m not 100% sold on this product; I’m batting 50/50 on it holding, but it held on this and you can barely tell where the splice meets.
Next up the shelves. Only one of the two were still in the house and unlike the brackets I could not use the original due to the bracket design. Instead I went to Home Depot and bought a 4′ x 8′ sheet of pine ply-wood and had them cut it in half and down to 64″ in length (only way to get it in my car). To make the front edge look finished, I also purchased 1/4″ x 3/4″ pine moulding that I glued and pin nailed to the plywood. I thought I wanted extra wide shelves, given I will only have two, but once I saw the first in the space I decided to rip it down to 18″. Still 2″ wider than original. After a dry fit they were ready for staining. Tip (I did not do and should have): sand the pine moulding after it’s installed. 1) to get rid of any glue residue and 2) that brand seems to have a waxy film on it that does not absorb stain well, which I knew from past projects. I was just eager to get this done and didn’t take the extra time.
I used Zar wood stain in Early American that I bought from Sherwin Williams for the kitchen built-in. This was a great way to see if I had been recommended the right color and I believe it is, so I’m anxious to start working on the built-in again. Britt Sang, door painter/stainer, used Minwax Polyacrylic on the inside of my front door and gave me the leftovers. I decided to use it on the shelves, just to protect them a bit. I had never used this product, but will use it again on the built-in. It was very easy to use and, unlike oil-based polyurethane products I’ve used, did not smell and dried fast. I applied three coats, sanding lightly with 220 grit sandpaper between each coat. It only needed 2 hours of drying time between coats, so this part was done in a day.
They recommend allowing 24 hours before actual use, but I placed in the closet and throw in two sachets of lavender to hopefully nix the faint chemical smell. I did wait before placing my contents. Thrilled with the end results and re-energized to tackle more.
Congrats on all of your work!