Build Your Own Wine Shelves
Building your own wine shelves is a fun and educational activity as you discover just how easy it can be to install wine shelves in any available space to store your favorite vintages. Wine shelves are much more than in-house storage of the wines you love to imbibe. They are also a natural conversation piece when you have guests over, as you can share and display your favorite prized vintages and share the stories of how you got each bottle and what they mean to you. You can also display your knowledge of wine and talk with friends and family about what you have learned. You can also use your new wine shelves as a central unifying theme to pull the decor of your kitchen or room space together, choosing artwork, color schemes, patterns and accents to match your wine room theme. Learn from experts how to build your own wine shelves and take the tips that work best for you.
Deciding to Build Your Own Wine Shelves
With the decision to start building your own wine shelves comes the decision about how involved you want the project to become. You can create you wine shelves from scratch, all the way down to purchasing your own materials from a local home goods or hardware store. You can buy a pre-packaged wine shelf kit from space-saving retailers such as the Container Store, Bed, Bath and Beyond, or other local retailers. You can also buy a pre-assembled kit and simply install it in the space you have reserved for your new wine shelves. The degree of complexity will likely factor in your skill level with home do-it-yourself projects, the type of wine storage and shelving system your vintages require, your budget, and your available time. Once you have considered each of these different elements you will have a better sense of what type of wine shelving home project you are leaning towards.
How to Build Your Own Wine Shelves from a Kit
From here, you can start to prepare to build your own wine shelves. First, decide on the number of wine bottles you want your shelving to accommodate. Next, scope out your space to find a place to install your new wine shelves. You should measure the entire space in height, depth, and breadth to make sure your bottles will fit comfortably on the shelves. Most modular wine rack shelving systems today that are designed for home do-it-yourself projects do not require complicated installation, but rather use modular pieces that can be easily added on to when you want to expand your shelving, and a free-standing but supported system so you don't have to do damage bolting your wine shelves into the walls or surrounding cabinetry. What you may wish to do instead of assembling the entire shelving system from scratch is to order a pre-made or kit wine shelving system from a store like the Wine Rack Shop and then design the room around the shelving. You can also visit the websites of companies like Vigilant Woodwork and design your own wine shelving system online and have it made and shipped to you.
How to Build Your Own Wine Shelves from Scratch
If you are a true do-it-yourselfer, and you do not have much experience with creating and building from plans, you will want to visit websites like the Woodworkers Workshop, where you can download free sets of plans for building a wine rack. You can use these plans and take them along with the specific measurements of your space to your local home goods or hardware store and get all the supplies you need. You will also need to make sure you have the right tools, including a wood plane, a measuring tape, a power drill, a screwdriver, a manual or electric saw, and a sander to smooth rough edges. You will also need some type of heavy construction glue or hinging system to make sure you can secure the shelving to the neighboring wall or cabinetry if you are not building a free-standing system.
It is also worthwhile to keep in mind, here again, that your wine shelves made from scratch do not have to be complicated. There are many wonderful designs for wine shelves that are innovative and space-saving, such as the vertical wine shelf which holds each bottle securely by its neck along a central seam, and wine shelves which feature a straight and easy to construct set of flat shelves instead of the intricate grooved bottle holders some wine shelving systems offer.
