The 10 Best IKEA Hacks We Saw in 2020

Apartment Therapy editors are always looking for a good IKEA hack. Whether it’s for your bathroom, your tiny closet, or you’re just trying to find something different to do with your EKET cabinet, IKEA hacks are a DIYer’s way to add some creativity to IKEA’s foundational form and function. This year brought plenty of smart and stylish hacks for every room of the home. Here are the 10 best IKEA hacks we saw in 2020.

Iris Gobbers loves plants and she found herself in a position where she had more plants than she had space—until she hacked a BESTA cabinet with grow lights to create her own thriving greenhouse in her apartment.

In this redo, Sarah Lafia starts with a plain white IKEA EKET cabinet and ends with an expensive-looking art deco piece. Her trick? Black washi tape.

She made diagonal lines with the tape and then began making triangles. Since washi tape is removable, she was able to trial and error until she loved the final product.

In this before and after, Jessica Bui and her boyfriend Tyler take a normal closet and transform it into an eye-catching mini-mudroom, complete with hooks, shelves, shoe cubbies, and an IKEA KALLAX shelf hacked into a bench.

When Melissa Lissack spotted mint green bar cabinets at places like Anthropologie and John Lewis, she decided to try her hand at making her own. Enter the IVAR cabinet, ripe for hacking. With a few curved pieces of MDF, a fun paint color, gold knobs and legs, and a lot of IKEA mirror tiles, Lissack transformed this blank cabinet into a retro party piece.

Melissa Rodgers wandered into the As-Is room at IKEA, and stumbled upon the 2019 Art Event Craig Green Birds Rug for $50. She was in the process of renovating her entryway, and while she didn’t need a rug, she did need some wall art. Melissa spent $20 on a wooden frame and nails, and voila: a statement making piece that’s perfect for the entryway.

Chris Kim and his wife Jenny knew that the lack of kitchen storage was going to be a problem when they moved into their space, but their solution of hacking a BESTA TV unit into a secret pantry is both beautiful and practical.

When Ella Hall and her husband realized they were going to have to carve out a nursery nook in their loft bedroom, they chose to repurpose as much as they could instead of buying brand new baby items. They hacked $70 IKEA IVAR cabinets with vintage legs, steel handles, and a removable changing pad in order to keep the vibe of the space consistent with the rest of their home.

Marly Dice and her husband Jason needed a mudroom, but did not need the high price of an entryway renovation, so they chose to DIY it. They hacked two PAX wardrobes to look like custom built-ins by placing them on either side of the entryway and building a bench and cubbies in between. They put up new crown molding and applied a fresh coat of paint to make everything look like it was made specifically for the space.

Having a functional home office might not have been on your to-do list before 2020, but it likely is now. Michael and Nicole Francis of 1776 Faux Farmhouse decided to opt for BILLY bookcases along the wall to create the look of custom built-ins in this IKEA hacked home office reno. A bold navy color brings a level of chic to the space-no need for artificial virtual zoom backgrounds when you have a space this stylish.

Another BILLY bookcase wonder, this laundry room redo by Caitlin Kelley really shows how you can make those bookcases work for you. She takes a boring laundry room and turns it into a calming, minimalist space by installing two BILLY bookcases with glass OXBERG doors, and a BILLY bookcase height extender above the laundry machines. The whole project only cost $500 and it looks seriously high-end.