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Library Update: Cabinets Installed


Written by Melissa Arndt, Principal Broker for Simplicity Real Estate Solutions.

To see what our library bookcases will look like when finished, see Planning For Our Library Project.

The first step of our project was to install the cabinets for the bottoms of the bookcases. In order to get the cabinets and bases to fit to the walls we had to cut the existing baseboards. We were able to save the trim that we will use to finish off the bottoms of the cabinets by removing those pieces carefully. The remainder of the baseboards on our walls ended up being strips of drywall held in with screws that had to be removed. It was a little odd seeing the strange material, but it was easy to remove since we didn’t have to worry about keeping those strips of drywall intact. We bought stock upper cabinets from the local home improvement store and 2×4’s for the base. Once we got the cabinets home we did a dry fit to ensure I measured correctly and the fit was perfect. However, I would caution you to give 1-2 inches extra if you have a window or doorway close to the end of your cabinets and don’t try to butt right up to it. I did not take a photo of the cabinet next to the window when we did the dry fit but it butted up against the window trim and further down in this blog post you will see how that became an issue.

Removing the baseboards using a Dremel Multi Max. The smaller trim on the front of the baseboards we removed carefully to reuse.
Dry fit was PERFECT!

Since wall cabinets do not have a base on them, we built bases for the cabinets using 2×4’s and I was excited to learn how to make an angle cut with my miter saw for the base of the corner cabinet. One thing I learned doing the angle cuts is that my next saw will have a laser on it that shows the cut line, it is difficult to line up the angle cuts to ensure the board remains at the correct length! We built a separate base for each cabinet in the size of the cabinet, but the base could also be built as one large piece for all the cabinets to sit on top of. Once the bases were all built, we did another dry fit to ensure the sizing was correct (it was!), check that the high point for the base was in the corner (it was), and secured the bases to the wall.

I was super proud of my 45 degree cuts for the corner cabinet base!

The fun really got started when we installed the cabinets. If you have never installed cabinets before (we had not) I would recommend you watch numerous YouTube videos and read instructions on the process because it is tricky. We started with the corner cabinet, which is why we wanted the high point to be in the corner since the base was not perfectly level. It we had built the base in one piece we could have leveled the base instead of each individual cabinet and that is likely what I would do if we were to do another similar project. The leveling of the corner cabinet was hard, bad words were said, and at one point my husband and our friend, Josh, stopped attempting to help me and sat back to enjoy the show. I was FINALLY able to get the corner cabinet perfectly level using the shims and attached it to the wall (we had located and marked the studs prior to installing the cabinets to ensure the attachments were made into the studs) with screws. Then I worked my way down the long length of cabinets over the next few days installing the cabinets by clamping them together, leveling, and then attaching them to the walls and each other.

The corner cabinet took forever and made me invent new curse words. All the other cabinets were easy peasy lemon squeezy in comparison.

When we got to a point where there were only 2 cabinets left to install my husband and I realized we would be covering up the outlets on the walls with those last 2 cabinets, 1 that is next to the doorway and 1 that is next to the window. This may be something you should consider before doing a similar project, and I was so glad we realized the issue before those last 2 cabinets were installed! We decided to move the outlets higher on the wall so the outlets sat above the countertop and we would be able to use them. We have swapped out outlets in our previous house with no problem so we felt confident to do it ourselves. We did get lucky that by putting the new outlet directly above the old one we were able to use the existing wire by undoing the wire from the old outlets, pulling it up through the hole for the new outlet, and trimming the wire for use in the new outlet. It we had to run new wires would definitely have had an electrician do the work! We did learn something very interesting about the room when making the hole for the new outlets: behind the drywall in the room were plywood sheets, which explained why we had such a hard time when we were locating studs!

The new outlets have USB ports and will sit just above the countertop for easy phone charging!
All the walls in this room have plywood behind the sheetrock! No wonder the stud finder was acting weird!

Our biggest learning lesson happened when I went to install the last cabinet, which is the one that is on the wall with the window. It no longer fit flush against the window trim! In the leveling of the corner cabinet we had to shim it about ¾ of an inch away from the wall to get everything level so that perfect length between the wall and window trim was now ¾ of an inch too long. Since we had already build the base to size for the cabinet we have and cut the baseboard to that length we thought it would be easier to cut part of the window trim away to fit the cabinet and shelves than buy a smaller cabinet and have to patch the baseboards. We will cross our fingers and see at the end if it turns out like we hope!

Oopsie! The cabinet didn’t butt up to the window trim once installed so we decided to cut a little of the trim out for the cabinet. We have a plan in our head for finishing this out so it looks great, we’ll see how it goes!

It took us a week to build the bases and install the cabinets since we are only able to fit in a few hours at a time to work on the project between work and kiddos. I am not sure how people are able to complete whole projects over a weekend, but that will likely never be me! The whole process is taking a little longer than I thought it would, so luckily we are not in a rush.

The next step is the countertop, which we are still in the middle of working on. I will give you an update on that part once it is installed and let you know what boo boos we made in that process!

Planning For Our Library Project


Written by Melissa Arndt, Principal Broker for Simplicity Real Estate Solutions.

A few months ago, my husband and I bought a larger home for our family after what felt like eons of looking. Now that we are somewhat settled in, I am ready to start on my first big project. When we first looked at our home, we weren’t sure what we were going to do with what we have affectionately been referring to as “the green room.” The former owners had it set up as a formal living room, but since we already have a family room plus a media room, we don’t feel the need to have the formal living room. Also, we’re not really formal people, so a new plan needed to be made. Currently, the green room contains our old sectional sofa (which we will be selling or moving into the shop, we are undecided on the sofa’s fate as of right now), broken down boxes and other household items that need to be moved into the shop, and my husband’s home office space. These photos show the current state of our green room.

My husband’s desk/home office area in the green room.
The sectional sofa and the corner of the green room with boxes and items that need to go out to the shop.
The view of the green room from the entranceway.

I am an avid reader (I typically read at least 1 book per week), and I have limited my reading to my Kindle app on my iPhone for the past few years. Now that we have the space I am eager to have a large collection of physical books available to me and a quiet area to curl up with them, so we have decided to turn the green room into a library/study. We will be building bookcases all along one wall and about 1/3 of the way down the adjacent wall to the window, we will make a reading area with chairs that can be curled up into in the corner that currently holds boxes and items to go to the shop, and my husband’s home office will remain in the corner that it currently occupies. Building bookcases instead of just shelves will allow some much-needed additional storage since, despite the large size of our home, we have a severe lack of storage space. In addition, the green room does not have very good lighting, so part of the plan will include lights on the top of the bookcases. The wall that the majority of the bookcases will go on is located opposite of a large arched opening from the entryway of our house, and I am very excited about that being one of the first things people see upon entering my home. Below are inspiration photos obtained from projects others have blogged about and the view from my entryway/formal dining room into the green room.

Idea obtained from https://melissalynch.com/our-built-in-bookshelves

Idea obtained from https://www.thriftydecorchick.com/2019/05/the-office-diy-built-ins-have-started.html
Idea obtained from https://www.thriftydecorchick.com/2019/05/the-office-diy-built-ins-have-started.html

Archway from entryway looking into the green room.

Now that I know what I want and how I want it to look, I had to make a plan for how to build it. With the help of our friend, Josh, I have sketched up a plan for the sizes of the bookcases, materials needed, and have shopped around for pricing. The bottom storage cabinets will be stock cabinets from the local home improvement store; we are going to use wall cabinets instead of base cabinets since I only want the doors and not the drawers that base cabinets have. We will build a base of 2×4’s under the cabinets so they sit up off the ground and allow us to finish off the bookcases with mouldings that match the rest of the room. We will be making the shelves from whitewood 1×12’s and have figured, based on measurements, how many of each we will need. We have also shopped around and found that buying 12 foot lengths of the 1”x12” boards instead of the 8 foot lengths will result in much less wasted wood after cuts are made and will be almost half the cost. We don’t have prices for all of the items that we will need yet, but the majority of the costs have been figured which means my husband and I are confident that we can afford to take this project on at this time. Also of note, we will be having our electrician do the electrical wiring for the fixtures to ensure it is done correctly and is safe. Below are the sketches and pricing notes I have made for this project.

Sketch of the bookcase to get sizing so we can figure lumber amounts and cost. Also to be used as a template once we begin construction.

On the top is an overhead view of the footprint for the bookcases. Also included are materials and costs and a drawing of the layout of one of the bookcases.

If you are wanting to do a large project such as this, I would encourage you to, at a minimum, do a rough outline with measurements and price out supplies to ensure you are not beginning a project that is beyond your budget. I would also encourage you to read blogs from those who have done similar projects, watch videos of how to do each step, and talk to friends/family who have experience in the type of project you are wanting to take on to ensure you will be able to do each step and complete the project. If you do not have COMPLETE confidence that you can complete it AND that your finished project will look good, enlist help or consider hiring someone to do the work. Between my husband and I we have ALMOST complete confidence that we can build the bookcases and that the finished project will look great, which is why the offer of assistance from our friend, Josh, is so welcome. Josh has the experience with woodworking and completing projects such as this that will ensure we end up with a library we can be proud of!

We will be starting this project soon and I look forward to updating our progress, providing tips and tricks we learn along the way, and sharing photos of our library in future posts!

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