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Small Space Solution: Narrowest Shelf Ever

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It's not a custom built piece, but neither is this a standard shelf width one can expect to find for books and curios. To utilize those narrow strips of wall between doors that seem to abound in older homes, Lotta Jansdotter came up with a solution just a tad out of the box for a unique decorating detail.

 
 

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Jansdotter pressed Ikea's BENNO CD tower into service as a bookshelf, adjusting the interior shelves to fit. We especially love how she left the top shelf very high in order to display the graceful length of a single vase.

BENNO CD tower at Ikea

Top Image: Thomas J. Story for Sunset

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organizing, shelving & storage

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Comments (14)

Cool idea! I almost bought one of those shelves the last time I was in Ikea, but the car I was in wouldn't fit the box. It's really, REALLY long. And it was cold out. Didn't want a window open for the 2 hour drive home. I needs me a nearby Ikea.

The instructions suggest that the shelf be anchored to the wall. When you see it in the flesh, you'll see why. Very tall. Very thin. Very tippy if you knock into it accidentally.

posted by ThatGrrl on April 2nd 2009 at 3:05pm
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i love that!!! yeah i don't think i'd be able to fit that in my car.

posted by s2k on April 2nd 2009 at 3:21pm
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Back in the day I had two of these flanking my decorative fireplace with square glass lamps inside. It was my favorite part of that apartment.

posted by kiljoywashere on April 2nd 2009 at 3:24pm
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ThatGrrl,

I'm with you. Ours is two hours away too. Once some friends and I rented a van from uHaul for the day to take to the IKEA in Chicago. It didn't cost much per person and allowed us to bring back all kinds of huge items that wouldn't fit in regular cars.

posted by madsarah on April 2nd 2009 at 3:51pm
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Great idea, I think every home has some narrow walls to fit something like this and make it more interesting

posted by kocka on April 2nd 2009 at 4:16pm
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how deep is it?

posted by pixstyx on April 2nd 2009 at 4:24pm
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as deep as a cd jewel-case approximately.

posted by Daniel Poitiers on April 2nd 2009 at 4:41pm
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It's not very deep at all... 6 3/4". I have this for CDS and DVDs and it's designed to fit such items, but you would have to have fairly small books to use it as pictured above. Great idea, though!

posted by DialJforJake on April 2nd 2009 at 4:43pm
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Madsarah, believe me, Ikea carpooling with a rented van has been discussed. Great idea!

posted by ThatGrrl on April 2nd 2009 at 4:43pm
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I have three of these in my home right now. I have a small, strange place between a wall bump out to hide air vents/ducts to my second floor and front interior wall. I considered having shelves made to custom fit, but worried about the expense.

Three of these fit perfectly, and allow my cable and my main entertainmet socket to be unemcumbered; they also don't block the floor vent.

And, I've varied the shelf heights for interest and stash DVD's, CD's, cassette tapes and little tchotchkes randomly throughout - keeps the dust off them too.

posted by KateMick on April 2nd 2009 at 4:47pm
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i like. good use of small otherwise unusable spots in the room. definitely like adjusting the heights to fit different sized things instead of all dvds or all cds. it just looks nicer that way.

i'd kill for a two hour drive to ikea. i gotta cross an ocean...

-if anyone has a few million dollars to donate for a franchise, i'll make them (and myself) rich...

posted by lab director on April 2nd 2009 at 4:54pm
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i have two of these, they are GREAT for apt dwellers who need to take advantage of their vertical space due to a serious lack of the horizontal variety. these and DWRs sapien bookshelves are awesome.

posted by modkitten on April 2nd 2009 at 5:34pm
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I have a 1x1x6' shelving unit that looks like it would fit into the space shown, but it might stick out a little too much in comparison. They used to be pretty widely available 10 years or so ago; I don't know about now.

posted by Miranda on April 4th 2009 at 3:50am
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could be good in bathroom that lacks basic toiletry storage too...

posted by shalgal on April 6th 2009 at 1:43pm
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