Interior designer Dusty Deyoe turns a client's built-in linen cabinet into a spectacular mirrored china cabinet with glass shelves and fashionable chicken-wire doors. Materials:
Hammer
Screwdriver
Measuring tape
Mirror mastic
Mirrors cut to size
Glass shelves cut to size
Jigsaw
Drill
Sandpaper
Chicken wire
Wire cutters
Staple gun and staples
Protective eyewear
Optional: spray paint for chicken wire
- Remove the front doors of the cabinet and set aside.
- Gut the interior of the cabinet. Dusty and her client smashed the existing shelves with hammers. Wear protective eyewear if you employ this method.
- Measure the inside of the cabinet. You'll need three interior measurements -- height, width and depth -- for ordering mirrors and glass. When measuring the depth of the cabinet, remember to subtract the width of the door so the door will shut (figure A). Check each measurement at several points: old pieces are often unevenly dimensioned. Have a glass shop cut mirrors and glass shelves to fit the cabinet.
- Install the mirrors on the back, sides and bottom of the cabinet with mirror mastic (figure B), setting the glass shelves in place between the mirror panels.
- To install chicken wire in the cabinet doors, first cut a rectangle out of the middle of the door. If the door has molding, add 1/4" to the depth of the molding, flip the door over so the inside faces up, and use the measurement to draw a cutting line around the interior of each door. Drill a hole in each corner to make room for a jigsaw blade (figure C), then use the jigsaw to cut along the lines (figure D). Remove the center panel, and sand the edges.
- Unroll the chicken wire, and use wire cutters to cut a piece to fit each door. Spray-paint the wire if desired.
- Attach the chicken wire to the inside of each door with a staple gun (figure E).
- Reattach the chicken-wire doors to the cabinet.
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