Materials: Ikea Lack shelf, Ikea Capita Legs, MDF, Acoustic Speaker Cloth, staples, cabinet magnets
Description: I wanted a TV stand that looked clean, modern, and would hide all of my components but leave them usable by remote. I had seen this Ikea shelf used as a tv stand a couple times and liked it but thought I could contribute something. On another Ikea hack I saw someone use speaker cloth stretched on a frame to cover up an opening and thought it was clever so I combined the ideas here.
Step 1. Acquire Lack shelf : )
Step 2. After putting the shelf together I made the necessary measurements to know what size to cut the MDF strips to for the frames.
Step 3. After having the MDF cut and tacked together into rectangular frames I screwed the cabinet magnets into place on the shelf. This was the hardest part. Getting those screws to penetrate the veneer on the shelf on the insides of the shelf was quite frustrating but we found beer helped with that.
Step 4. I then cut the speaker cloth to the appropriate sizes and stapled them to the MDF frames.
Step 5. I decided to use the feet to raise the level of the shelf and TV a bit higher and to give a more 'open' and 'clean' look. I used 8 legs total as I wanted it to be as sturdy as possible, my plasma TV is quite heavy. I arranged them with 2 on each end and in the middle. The other 2 legs were mounted in the middle a quarter of the way in from the ends to provide good support where the tv would be.
*Note: You'll notice there is a bit of a gap inbetween the frames and the shelf openings, this was unintentional. The Home Depot guy cut the MDF the wrong size and we had to re cut them to even it out and thats what happened. I decided it wasn't the end of the world. Oh, and dont mind the SNES hiding under there.
What we're left with is a TV stand that looks really clean, hides aways all the components and gives me easy access to them when necessary. The whole project was finished over the course of a few days. I'm quite happy with how it turned out but I need to do some serious cable management behind this thing. I'm thinking about screwing some zip ties to the back and running the wires through there....I'll get around to it.
~ Justin Clark, Lakewood, Ohio
