Part 4 – Closet Island Progress – How To Build Drawers The Easiest Way (Plus, The News You’ve Been Waiting For)

First, I wished to indicate you that I made a little bit of a design change. I had initially deliberate on placing 4 drawers in every part. This was the plan for the facet that faces the hanging garments facet of the closet…

After which on the facet that faces the jewellery/mirror facet of the closet, I deliberate for this configuration, with 4 drawers on the left facet and cupboards on the correct facet.

So I made a decision to make the 2 sections on the hanging garments facet of the closet deeper and solely have three drawers in every part. The bins themselves are 8.5 inches excessive, however there will probably be more room as soon as the drawer entrance goes on. The drawer fronts on these will probably be about 9.25 inches excessive. Clearly, drawer bins don’t sit proper on high of one another in a dresser or cupboard. Right here’s what these drawer bins appear to be…

And right here’s what they appear to be within the part that can have drawers on each side. I made them as massive as I might whereas leaving a fraction of an inch between them the place the backs meet.

However on the facet that faces the jewellery/mirror facet of the closet, I made a decision to maintain 4 drawers. The underside one is a deep drawer, and the opposite three are shallower. Clearly, they’re not put in but, and once more, drawer bins aren’t stacked on one another like that once they’re put in. There will probably be house between them as soon as they’re put in and the drawer fronts are on.

First, I extremely advocate utilizing staples as a substitute of nails to assemble a drawer field like this. My drawer bins are made out of 1/2-inch plywood, so I used these 1-inch slim crown staples. (Please forgive my messy wooden filler-covered fingers.)

For these, you want a slim crown stapler, which appears to be like identical to a nail gun. I acquired this Porter Cable slim crown staple gun at Residence Depot. I typically use it for upholstery tasks, but it surely’s additionally nice for tasks like these simple drawer bins.

As I confirmed you yesterday, I reduce these 5 items for every drawer field. The underside piece is reduce to the completed size and width of the drawer field minus one inch in every path. So if I need my completed drawer field to be 35″ x 14″, the underside piece is reduce to 34″ x 13″. The back and front items are reduce to the identical width because the as the underside piece (34″) and the peak that I need this drawer field to be (this one is 4.5″). And the perimeters are reduce to the completed measurement of the drawer field (14″) and the peak of the drawer field (4.5″).

I used my desk noticed to tear the plywood to the proper widths, after which used my miter noticed to chop them to the precise lengths I wanted.

Assembling these is as simple as stapling the back and front items to the underside piece, after which stapling the ends on. It actually can’t get a lot simpler than that. You possibly can see right here that I used 9 staples to staple the back and front items to the underside piece (the drawer field is clearly turned the other way up right here). So the benefit of utilizing staples is that these 9 staples are just about the equal of 18 nails. I put them roughly 4.5 inches aside.

As soon as the back and front had been hooked up to the underside piece, I hooked up the ends, stapling that on all three sides.

Right here’s a have a look at it from the underside. I acquired a bit aggressive with the sander on this piece. 😀

However you may see that the facet items prolong 1/2″ previous the underside piece on either side to cowl the sides of the back and front items.

Staples typically go in cleaner than nails, and so they don’t generally tend to bend as they go in and are available out the facet of the wooden like nails typically do. However they do typically take a chip out of the plywood, as you may see right here. However that’s nothing {that a} little bit of wooden filler gained’t repair.

And that’s it. It truly is the best sort of drawer field to construct, and because it’s put along with staples, it very sturdy. I don’t know that I’d advocate this very fundamental sort of drawer field for a kitchen or one other room that will get a ton of visitors and use every day. For these, I’d in all probability advocate one other methodology of meeting. However for one thing like this dresser, I personally assume they work completely.

And as soon as it’s assembled, I fill the staple holes on the perimeters with wooden filler, after which sand the entire thing, particularly ensuring that the entire joints the place the items come collectively, in addition to the highest edges of the drawer field and the corners the place they meet, are all sanded clean.

You may also use iron-on edge banding to cowl the highest edges of the drawer field to provide it a very nice, clear, completed look, which I’ll in all probability do on these.

On a random observe, do y’all keep in mind this wallpaper I designed to go within the studio toilet? Clearly, I gained’t be utilizing it in there now for the reason that plan is to show that loo right into a walk-through pantry, so I’m contemplating utilizing it to both line my drawers or possibly use on the perimeters of the drawers only for a enjoyable little bit of colour when the drawers are open.

The colours aren’t excellent for this room. The wallpaper has plenty of purple in it and no darkish blue. However does it actually matter? It gained’t present within the room except I open a drawer, so actually, the colour is only for enjoyable and just for my enjoyment once I open a drawer.