Our apartment is covered in wall-to-wall carpeting. While we'd prefer to have hardwoods throughout, we're learning to love the plush beneath our feet—except when it comes to that blasted home office. Our rolling task chair won't play nice with our plush rug, so we've scoured the web for some solutions—any solutions!—less offensive than those hideous rubber plastic mats. Here's one store-bought chair mat and two rad DIY projects with a more modern approach.
The office is already a plenty stressful place without the added hassle of untangling your chair casters from your plush carpeting. Save your wheels—and your stylish soul—with one of these more modern takes on the classically hideous plastic chair mat.
SPLURGE: Anji Mountain Bamboo Tri-Fold Office Chair Mat
We love the look of this bamboo rolling mat way better than that grippy patterned plastic we're used to spotting in cubicles. Grab it from Linens-N-Things for $270.
DIY: Sugar Bee Craft's Plywood Rug
Of course, if $270 for a chair mat is too rich for your blood, you could try out a DIY solution, like this "plywood rug" from Sugar Bee Crafts. Featured previously on Re-Nest, this project makes good re-use of a piece of scrap wood as a rolling surface.
RECYCLE: Sugar Pond's IKEA-Hacked Plastic Mat
And what if you already have a plastic mat, but you hate it? Well, you get creative with a swatch of IKEA fabric and a can of spray adhesive, like in this post on Sugar Pond. You don't have to use IKEA fabric, of course, but we're loving the look of covering up a functional office chair mat with a more stylish pattern.
(Images: Linens-N-Things, Sugar Bee Crafts, Sugar Pond)
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You can get the wooden chair mats at Staples for around $150.
I got the Anji Mountain Bamboo roll mat (not tri-fold). It looks nice but has developed some cracks from where my chair wheels press too hard on the edges of each slat. Odds are this is why they now have the tri-fold version.
Still, I hunted and hunted and got mine on target.com with a few coupons for $80 shipped.
Looks like Sugar Pond is an invite-only blog these days - does anyone know where else one could find instructions on decorating a plastic chair mat? I'm due to get a new one in my office and want to start it off right.