honeycomb shelves – a fun DIY!
I don’t know about you, but I have been seeing these honeycomb shelves everywhere on Pinterest, but not too often in the store. When I would happen across one in person, they were usually fairly flimsy and not well finished.
So I though, why not make my own?
Since then, I’ve had so many others asking about the project I just had to share it!
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What you will need
I went ahead and made a full tool list and step by step project plans that you can get here, but I’d like to touch on a few things.
table saw substitutes
Most of the supplies you will need for this project are very accessible and most are inexpensive! The biggest thing that may get in your way is the table saw.
I know these aren’t common household items, so a couple of solutions to avoid the table saw for this project all together are:
- Have your hardware store do the main cuts for you. I purchased my wood at Home Depot, and they are always happy to do a few basic cuts to make your project easier at no extra charge.
- Substitute a circular saw and set up a ‘ruler’ with an extra length of wood. This will allow you to create those straight cuts on your own.
wood
As supplies go, wood will be your biggest purchase for this project, and even then it’s still very affordable! I used a laminated pine panel, so it was planed, smooth, and ready to go – no extra work needed.
You can, however, change up your wood type depending on the look you are going for.
fasteners and screws
How you hang the shelf will depend on the size of the shelf, the weight it will be holding, and the wall you are mounting to.
My shelf was being fastened to wood studs through drywall, so I will show you how to do that in my video you’ll find below. However, be sure to make adjustments if you are fastening to metal studs, concrete, or any other scenario. Safety first!
Troubleshooting the honeycomb shelves
A few things we ran into during the process:
nailing
The fact the 6 individual pieces of each hexagon are cut to an angle makes it more challenging to nail together, so here is what we found worked.
First, use some wood glue to give them a little stick to each other, or substitute some PL Construction Adhesive for serious grip!
Second, place and an extra piece of wood on top of the pieces you are about to nail together before you clamp them. This will ensure the clamp stays firmly in place.
filling the nail holes
Here we found that skipping a traditional wood filler was the way to go. The exception would be if you choose not to stain your shelf, then the filler would probably blend in quite nicely. However, with a stain, the filler tends to make the nail holes even more visible. We substituted a Furniture Repair Wax instead, which gave a seamless finish.
Hiding the brackets
This is a tricky one! Now, they are not completely invisible, of course, but you can really only see them if you look at the shelf from the underside. So I am happy with that, not many people will be looking at it from that angle anyways!
What we did was hang all the brackets on the wall before attaching them to the shelf itself. This required some measuring beforehand, but allowed the bracket to hide behind the shelf instead of being visible on the wall.
decorating your honeycomb shelf
This is my favorite part! Styling your shelves is so fun and a great way to add your own touch to this trendy design.
A few things you might consider:
- Plants
- Vases
- Books
- Candles(not for lighting ;))
- Essential Oils
- Battery Operated Diffuser
- Pictures
- Lantern
- Hourglass
- Antler
- Old Camera
- Dried or Fresh Flowers
I’d love to hear how you end up decorating your shelves!
how I built my honeycomb shelves
don’t forget the plans!
Please enjoy these project plans, they are totally free! They will take you through the process from the tools list to hanging up your masterpiece.
I hope you enjoy making these shelves as much as I did and they grace your walls for years to come!
With Gratitude,
