This Inexpensive Material Is Your Key to a Stylish Decor Hack

published Sep 12, 2019
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The humble dowel is not so humble these days. In particular, the half-moon dowel, or half-round dowel, is more or less having a moment, and somehow managing to look way more chic and expensive than it is. Here are six hacks so you can half-moon dowel it up in your own home.

Turn a plain cabinet into a mid-century vintage lookalike

For a perfect example of the trend, check out blogger Lovisa of Stockholm’s sophisticated IKEA hack on the simple IVAR pine cabinet. Lovisa used tiny nails to attach 50 half-moon dowels to the cabinet surface, then painted everything in Farrow & Ball’s Drop Cloth. A similar project swapped in squared-off dowels in pine for an entirely different look and feel.

Give a plain planter a colorful update

Gina of the Australian blog Style Curator gave the half-moon dowel treatment to a DIY box planter. She painted hers in a palette of sorbet colors, but you can pick whatever colors fit your decor best, or embrace the natural wood.

Make the top of your cabinets the real focal point

For Hunker, Francesca of Fall for DIY covered the sides and top of IKEA’s MACKAPÄR shoe cabinet to create chic bedroom storage that you wouldn’t mind waking up to every day.

Jazz up a wooden vase with some eye-catching dowels

Half-round dowels look fabulous on a smaller scale, too. Francesca used 10 millimeter versions and a postal tube to DIY this wooden vase.

Create a simple, but effective poster frame

Perhaps one of the easiest DIYs you can make with half-round dowels is this DIY minimalist poster frame from The Homesteady. It’s reusable!

Or install an entire accent wall made of dowels

This DIY accent wall by Australian timber company Porta features half-round dowels in Tasmanian Oak. OK, so when you go this big, it isn’t cheap, but it is gorgeous.