One of the first items to fixed was the closet in the office/ Brick Build Room. This closet was 6' deep, 4' 6" wide, 10' high and the 28" door opens in. We needed horizontal space to store items. This closet also came with a power plug and network connection.
DISCLAIMER: I reviewed multiple IKEA Hacks on the WEB. The best one was an Ask This Old House where they used the Billy Bookcase (but never mentioned the name) and installed on one side of the room on either side of a window. (see here) In almost every case of these various Hacks, there were comments about the durability of the bookcase with heavy objects on the shelves. And if you are going to all this trouble, why not just build custom bookcases. Well for one is the cost and then the time. Of the six bookcases used, only one is 30", the remainder are 15" or shorter. On the 30" bookcase, we are careful what we put there. Our biggest problem was availability. Seems with the lock downs, everyone was remodeling their homes and at least on the West Coast getting these bookcases was problematic.
First requirement was to have a built in appearance, which meant extending the baseboard and placing styles on the bookcase to achieve this look. Second was to decide the arrangement. Placing Billy Bookcases on both long walls was the easiest approach to this. The other approach was to curve the bookcases around the back. IKEA does have metal attachments to accomplish this setup, where the bookcase is at 45 degrees and thus turns the corner. After analyzing both approaches, the curved approach around the back would give a few more feet of horizontal space than just lining the two long walls. While this curved approach had a very nice aesthetic appeal, it was going to be much more difficult. The bookcase against the far wall would have to be heavily customized, plus handling the 45 degree placement.
Determining the layout was the first task. The long walls were actually different lengths since the door interfered with the right wall. I purchased the IKEA 45 degree brackets and four 15" wide Billy Bookcases to start to determine the exact measurements. In the end I did not use these brackets since they raised the bookcase off the floor almost an 1/8". That is OK on carpet, but on solid floor that would never work. Using both the IKEA website and actual measurements, I determined this would be the layout. Starting on the right wall and going around to the left, 15" bookcase against the right wall, 15" bookcase at 45 degrees, modified 15" bookcase (~8.5" wide) against the back wall, 15" bookcase at 45 degrees, 15" bookcase against the left wall and finally a 30" bookcase against the left wall.
To make the baseboard seamless with the rest of the house, the bookcases needed to be raised 1.75". To accomplish this I used 1/2" and plywood and 1" by lumber that I ripped down to the correct width. Since the 1/2" was nominal, I actually measured the plywood and then compensated with the 1" by lumber. This resulted in the framing below.
These two show the progress and finished framing. The frame is connected to the walls with screws, which makes this framing very secure.
Next will be to start fitting the bookcases.
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