Cheap-o Bathroom Storage

I stumbled across this idea somewhere on the internet awhile ago and made a mental note- no bookmark- so thank you to whomever came up with this one. As I have mentioned over and over again, old houses have a serious lack of storage. This is especially true in the bathroom. Two years ago, we renovated the master bathroom and added a larger vanity with two shelves. However, there is still not enough room for everything. So I decided to add a shelf. I went to my local Lowe's and checked out the closet and shelving aisle. There are many options from pre-painted to rubber coated metal. Keeping in my mind that this would be going in the bathroom I was skeptical of purchasing he pre-painted MDF board. I immediately imagined the board cracking and falling apart. So I decided to check out the options in the lumber section. Here I found exactly what I was looking for for half the price! I chose a 1 inch by 12 inch by 4 ft. board which was about 5 bucks. The prepainted MDF boards in the closet section started at $10. Knowing that I had bright white semi-gloss paint left over from the stair project, I grabbed my board and brackets and headed on home.

Here are the items that I used...

Bought-
2 white brackets  for $1.47 each
1 board (1 by 12 by 4ft.) for $5



Had at home-
Drill
Valspar semi-gloss paint in Ultra White
6 screws
Paint brush

First, I needed to paint the board. I used my leftover stair riser paint.

I painted the board with three coats for a little extra moisture protection. I let it dry for about 24 hours to make sure it was good to go before hanging it. Then I got out my drill, brackets, and screws.

I decided that I wanted the shelf just slightly above the door frame.

A few screws and some rearranging, and here's what it looks like now.

 

 And my favorite view is looking through the mirror over the sink- you can see the shelf in the reflection. It seems so cozy now! And I love that I can have a plant in the bathroom now too. 

I'm thinking about installing another above the door shelf in the kitchen to display some of my Pyrex collection. My only qualm is that the metal brackets are not the most asthetically pleasing option. I think next time around I may pick a wood option or maybe spray paint the brackets a funky color. Also, I'm thinking that I'll dot some white paint on the tops of the exposed screws to help them blend in.

The total cost for this project was about eight bucks, it took no skill, and was not time consuming. In addition, I love that it makes an otherwise unusable/neglected space useful and pleasing to the eye.