IKEA Cabinets Are the Secret to This High-End (but Low-Cost) Mudroom

When it comes to thinking outside the box, sometimes a quote for custom woodwork is all that’s needed to push yourself into finding a more creative—and affordable—solution. Take Marly Dice, of A Brick Home, and her husband Jason, who knew they wanted create a functional mudroom off their home’s heavily-trafficked side entrance. But once they called up a pro for a quote to create the dream mudroom they’d sketched out themselves, they were hesitant about the high cost. Their solution? DIY it, of course.

Rather than building the mudroom unit completely from scratch, they decided to hack a piece of existing furniture into the organized built-in unit they were envisioning: something with hanging storage as well as shelves and a bench. Marly got to sourcing prefab wardrobes on the internet to serve as the hanging storage. IKEA’s PAX was the winner, since at just over 93 inches tall, it came almost to ceiling height. This entryway IKEA hack was the perfect solution for their needs.

The couple purchased and assembled two of the IKEA wardrobes in the newly designated mudroom; in between the units, Jason constructed a seating bench and a couple of cubbies for more storage. New crown molding, which conceals the gap between the top of the wardrobe and the ceiling, plus some paint and baseboards tie the whole unit together. Marly picked out a couple sets of 11.5-inch stainless steel handles for the doors, and installed a few satin nickel hooks to hold even more accessories. 

Finished with a cushion for the seat and boxes for the overhead cubbies, the final space is now anything but off-the-shelf. “It has been a long process getting our mudroom room to the point it is at now, but it was totally 100% worth the wait,” writes Marly.