An Ikea Kura bed felt playhouse

Materials: Kura bunk bed, felt

Description:
I recently finished a felt playhouse for my daughter as the bottom of her bed is being used for toy storage.

Read more about the Kura felt playhouse.

~ Anna

Baby Crib with open shelving

Materials: Billy, Gulliver, Perfect Adel oven panels

Description: I took Ikea crib Gulliver, two oven panels from Ikea kitchen line, and old favourite Billy book shelf. One oven panel became a headboard and another became backing for Billy, and Billy became a foot-board.

The actual, foot-board and headboard from Gulliver I used as a template to drill the holes on the oven panels. Use the existing heardware. And oven panel attached to Billy with corner mounting pieces (all four corners).

See more of the crib with open shelving.

~ Alissa C.

Dolly bunkbed

Materials: gorm shelves

Description: I decided to make a dolly bunkbed for my daughter's dollies by using two sets of Ikea gorm height extension posts and two short three plank gorm shelves. Simply made two mattresses out of fabric scraps bound with the Ikea iron-on hemming tape and filled with polyfill. The blankies were cut from an old Ikea fleece blanket. My daughter's pretty chuffed with them, alright!

~ Izreen Ismail, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Expedit Baby Closet

Materials: 2x8 and 4x4 Expedit shelves, white

Description: We have very limited space and really small closets in our home, so I came up with an idea to utilize vertical space for baby clothes.

We already had the 2x8 Expedit, so this hack only cost around $40 for the new 4x4 unit, closet rod and rod holders.

We simply put the 4x4 Expedit together leaving out the inner shelving, and installed a closet rod. The 2 units aren't attached to each other, but I did use those gummy sticky dots for stability in addition to the wall mounting hardware included with the Expedit.

~ Valerie Foster, Phoenix, AZ

Personalized Kura Bed fit for a Princess with Playhouse Underneath

Materials: Kura Bed, wooden letters, wood cutouts, bunk bed curtain, paint, canopy, SMILA BLOMMA wall lamp

Description: We wanted our 4 year old daughter to have a bed with stairs leading to a loft to sleep and space underneath to use as a playhouse.

We bought a Kura bed, painted it 3 different colors. The trim is painted light pink, the smaller panel in front is fuchsia and the longer end panel is purple with pink slates. We added a princess canopy on top. We attached cutouts on the front panel and added wooden letters to the front panel with the words princess and her name. We made the bottom a playhouse by attaching a bunk bed curtain with working windows, curtains, and doors on the bottom of the bed using double-faced adhesive velcro and placing a pink SMILA BLOMMA wall lamp for her to use when she reads her books is hanging out in her "house" as she calls it.

See more at of the Kura bed with Playhouse.

~ Adrian and Leslie-Ann, Northern Virginia

For LACK Of A Reasonably Priced Chalk Table

Materials: Lack Side Table, Idealisk Measuring Cup

Description: What happens when you're fed up with the cheap quality, high priced, children furniture sold in stores???

You say screw it and make your own cheap quality furniture for less.

This hack came about when I tried to purchase a chalk table for my preschool art classes. As I later discovered that these chalkboard tables can go for an obscene amount of money, I figured, "I can build it for less than $50." I was DEAD WRONG because it only cost me less than $25 in materials.

See more of the Lack chalk table.

~ Yencey, New York City

Kids creativity corner at a carnival

Materials: RAM Frame

Description: At a Kids carnival the tiny kids creativity booth had IKEA plain wooden RAM Frames with some glitter,stars, flowers and glue they customized the frames to whatever style they wanted and most of the kids remembered their moms. Ah adorable!

~ BBS Alumni Environmental Committee, Kuwait

Malm Toddler Bed under Malm-inspired Bunk

Materials: Malm Bed and Dresser

Description: After being inspired by so many cool projects on this website, hoping my daughter would sleep in her own room, and deciding I didn't want to pay $2500 for kids' bunk beds I came up with a design to use used Malm items to make my kids a new bedroom set.

This was a combination of three easy hacks and one harder one requiring actual building. I got two used Malm beds, and a used Malm dresser. I used the two headboards from the beds to make my toddler's bed- simply replacing the footboard with the second headboard, so she couldn't scoot off the bottom of the bed and under the bunk by accident. I used the rails and slats from the second bed on the upper bed that I built to match the Malm beds- the headboard, footboard, and stair wall are 2" thick, and the headboard is the same height above the mattress as the Malm headboard. To fit in my space the upper bunk is narrower than Malm - only 41", and the upper bed is longer than Malm -77" so that I could fit both the Malm bed and Malm dresser underneath.

The stairs are drawers - inspired by Berg furniture for kids, but I also thought about using a modified Trofast stair system. I wanted the furniture to match existing paint, and using recomendations from this site to use special primer and extra long screws, I painted all pieces bright white, and attached knobs to the Malm dresser.

~ Ellen Farrow, Los Gatos, CA

Lego table from IKEA kitchen cabinet door

Materials: Ikea kitchen cabinet door, VIKA legs, Trofast bin, LEGO base boards

Description:

Last month IKEA in Florida were discontinuing a lot of kitchen cabinet doors for $3 a piece. I bought a bunch of them to my Playstation 3 Racing cockpits (for this see p.83 post #1650). Some where left over and since I needed a Lego table I made this one in less than 90 minutes.

With a jigsaw I simply made a hole in the middle.
I glued the Lego base boards for durability.
I attached 4x VIKA legs ($3.50 each)
I attached a Trofast bin by screwing it on the underside.
Thats it!

P.S. You can also easily modify this. If you dont want to make a hole you can instead use a Trofast bin as a drawer. You will need the rails from the WHITE Trofast cabinet (the pine colored does not come with
rails). If in stock IKEA customer counter or AS-IS will usually give them for free.

~ Erik

Kura bed hack

Materials: Kura bed

Description:

I found inspiring images on your site as well as Ohdeedoh for this bed. I bought it from Craig's list, painted it, added tiles from inhabitliving.com, a la another post and removed a few side panels. I am so pleased with the results, it's not the Uffizi bunk bed of my dreams, but my two year old daughter loves her new big girl bed. The cost was $50 for the bed and around $150 for the paint and wall tiles. Her room is a work in progress but almost all Ikea.

~ Kristin

Children's table turned into stage

Materials: LÄTT children's table and chairs

Description:
This isn't mine ... but I thought it was pretty inspired.

See more of the children's table stage.

~ Kat

Child-proof vice versa

Materials: cavity anchor, screw

Description: It is a solution for a most common problem if you have to re-equip your furniture in order to make it child-proof.

IKEA offers the PATRULL drawer/cabinet catch, which will, in their words, "Reduce[] the risk of the child reaching improper contents in drawers/cabinets." As for that, the tiny plastic catch serves its purpose well. Unfortunately, at the same time it increases the risk of the child jamming its fingers because it only prevents a drawer from being opened for more than 4 or 5 centimeters, bot not from being closed again.

So I decided to enhance the mechanism by using a special kind of cavity anchor in addition to the PATRULL catch. I cut off one of the anchor's two blades and screwed it in right above the catch. The effect is, now when you try to open the drawer it will be stuck in both directions. You choose either to open it further by pressing in the catch or to close it entirely by pressing in the remaining blade of the anchor. That's it.

~ Marcus Wilhelm, Kassel, Germany

Secret Passage and Fort for Kids Using Expedit Bookcase and Desk

Materials: Expedit

Description: I recently redid my little boy's room. Like everyone, we didn't want to spend a lot of money, yet wanted something that would last into his teenage years.

We decided to purchase the Expedit bookcase and desk since they would grow with him.  When he's an adolescent, he'll actually be able to use the desk as a desk, but while he's a toddler, the bookcase serves as a
toy/book organizer as well as a secret passage into his fort which is actually the area under the desk.

To create the fort, I took a shower curtain rod and a sheet to make the curtain that hangs under the desk. We added a rope light for a few bucks underneath and our little man loves it.

~ Amy W.

Little desk and armchair

Materials: Rast

Description:
I took my idea from "Rast Sensory Table", so I thank its creator.

I bought two RAST nightstand for 9,99 €(one) and hacked them.
I screwed four shorter wooden board in a little armchair, and the longer ones in a little desk!

I also screwed a pink PS VALLO on the right side, very cheap and agreeble look, it contains papersheets, drawing pens, pencils etc.

Funny, cheap and usable!

~ remoxxx

Hacking Antilop for the bath

Materials: Antilop

Description: From table with legs to bath without, Antilop is a winner!!

~ Teresa

Bunk Beds for Dolls or Kitty Cats

Materials: Oddvar Stool

Description: I took the legs of an Oddvar Stool, and two boards cut to fit inside, covered with a cushy fabric, and secured the boards to the stool legs. American Girl Dolls occupied for a while, but kitties soon took over.

~ Ingrid S., Ohio

Child's Play Kitchen Set

Materials: RAST nightstand, GRUNDTAL towel rail, RIGEL hook, ATTEST knobs, ATTEST handles, LINDSDAL knobs, CAPITA legs

Description: I used two RAST nightstands with multiple other Ikea items to make a child's play kitchen set - a stove/oven with a sink, and a separate refrigerator.

See Becky's blog for detailed list of materials and instructions.

~ GTown

Primary school kitchen ergonomic makeover

Materials: Two Udden workbenches, five Snack wood boxes (now sadly discontinued), Rill weels, Molger hooks, scrapwood for cleats, high-tack glue, screws, plugs, drill, saw, hammer.

Description: My kid's school teachers had put up a request for a mother to make new curtains, for under the classroom kitchen sink. After inspecting the small arts and crafts kitchen, I concluded it was an ergonomic horror for the teachers: they had to stoop down to the floor (on hands and knees) to get anything from under it. Besides, the tiles were practically falling off the wall, and they needed extra storage space in the classroom. Being a dad, I didn't see myself sewing curtains and prolonging the dysfunctional setup, so I took a different approach.

'before' from another classroom

After some negotiating, the teachers got a little budget to redo the kitchen, with second hand kitchen cabinets. While at Ikea to purchase the wooden Snack boxes for under the countertop, I discovered two Uden workbenches on big discount, called the teacher and she agreed to use them to replace the old tiles.

I hammered the rims flat, and used a French cleat, scrapwood pieces jammed under the rims and high tack glue to fix the two panels in place, and finished with some sealant kit (polymer). (Tip: to prevent wobbly effect, attach a sizeable piece of wood in the centre of the panels).

The boxes with wheels make it much easier to store and reach art supplies. I had a strip of Molger hooks lying around so I attached that to the hanging cabinets for towels etc. Best thing: the stainless steel tops double as magnetic backboards to attach things to. From shabby kitchen to luxury style art corner, all for around one hundred euro's and an afternoon of work.

I didn't take before pictures, so the before pictures are from another classroom with a similar setup as the before situation, just to get an idea of the ergonomic disaster.

~ G.V.M., The Netherlands