Here are 20 do-it-yourself projects that we can tackle right now to beautify the kitchen, organize the closets, fix what squeaks and creaks around the house, make the front door smarter, fire up the backyard and much more. So let’s roll up our sleeves and start making the home beautiful!
Create a chalkboard wall
Creating a chalkboard wall is an easy way to transform a room, perhaps to serve as a canvas where your kids can do art, or as a practical surface where you can write a list of what needs to be picked up at the store. After you get curbside or home delivery of chalkboard paint, you’ll probably have to apply two coats to the wall to get proper coverage. If the wall surface isn’t smooth, you may have to sandpaper it first.
Float a bookshelf
Building a floating bookshelf that makes your books (or whatever you want to put on it) look as if they are suspended in air is a fairly easy DIY project. Apartment Therapy, a home and decor site, suggests not one but five ways to build them, including ones with easy home-delivered kits that have everything you need and can get you up and floating in a few minutes.
Spruce up the floor with peel-and-stick vinyl tiles
Want to transform your old concrete or tired wooden floor but have minimal DIY aptitude? Then use peel-and-stick vinyl tiles. Better Homes and Gardens says reassuringly: “It requires only basic skills, minimal time, and a few tools.” You will need a good eye when you lay the first row of tiles, though, since everything that comes after that depends on it being straight.
Make your door smarter
If you want to make your home smarter, you can start with your front door, ordering a video doorbell kit. Once it’s installed, you can see who is coming to your front door, talk to them and decide whether or not to let them in from wherever you are with your smartphone. You can install a wired or (even easier) a wireless video doorbell.
Fix your squeaks and creaks
Beds that squeak, floors that creak—sometimes our homes and apartments make more noises than we like. And sometimes the fixes can be easy. For example, sweeping baby powder into the seams of a wooden floor may quiet it. Or tightening the bed-frame bolts with a wrench may help get rid of those unwanted noises every time you roll over. Squeaky door hinges may be resolved with a spray of WD-40.
Organize your closets
You have things lost in your closet that go back two relationships ago. Now that you’ve got time on your hands, perhaps you should take the door by the handle and start organizing the closet. House Beautiful offers 30 ideas for this task “that’ll make your space feel so much bigger.” Putting bulky clothing items in a shoe organizer is one good suggestion.
Remove candle wax and repurpose the jars
You love your scented candles—but when the candle has burnt down, you don’t know what to do with its decorative jar, which has wax stuck on the bottom. Well, you can upcycle it by first putting the jar in the freezer overnight and then easily breaking the wax into pieces with a knife, letting them clatter out. Then you can turn the jar into a pretty planter.
Hang your pictures like a pro
If you’re self-isolating at home, there’s no need to stare at blank walls. It’s time to hang some of your art and photographs. This pro method takes you through the steps. You’ll only need some picture hooks, a hammer, measuring tape, pencil, D-rings, hanging wire and, yes, some nice framed art. If you don’t have art, you have time to learn how to make your own.
Do a mini kitchen reno
A major kitchen renovation can cost an arm and a leg. But if you want to give your kitchen a small facelift (and your mood a modest boost), then think about adding a colourful backsplash with peel-and-stick tiles, or changing the knobs on the cabinets and drawers with ones ordered from a home decor shop. The knobs can be either timelessly stylish (think brass or black matte) or as eclectic and fun as you are.
Tackle creative house painting
If you can rouse yourself enough to do some house painting, kick your game up a notch and attempt a creative wall painting or design. The RenoGuide offers 45 ideas for this, including a honeycomb design, “bright and cool” turquoise ombre, gingham style, orange burst and 3D boxes.
Build a DIY entertainment centre
If you have mid-level handyperson skills and the budget bandwidth for a couple of hundred dollars of materials, you can tame your tech clutter with a DIY home entertainment centre. It should take you about five hours to build this modern-inspired sleek unit for your television, streaming boxes, DVR and so on.
Cover the view with window film
If you don’t like the view from your window, or want a little more privacy, you can cover the glass, partly or wholly, with a decorative window film. These come in a variety of opacities and patterns, which can mimic everything from etched glass to rice paper. You can also get heat-control window film to reduce your energy bills, or glare-control window film to help prevent TV and computer screen washout from sunlight glare.
Spice up your life
If you like to cook with spices, you know the pain of pawing through a lot of packages searching for the garam masala as you are making the meal. Now is the time to organize the spices so they are easily found, perhaps bottling and labelling them if they are just in plastic pouches. And if you don’t have a spice rack, no worry. You could use an inexpensive shower caddy and hang it from a cabinet door or rack.
Make your own ladder shelf
You’ll have to do this project step by step—creating your own ladder shelf to display stuff in your living room or kitchen, or using it outdoors to show off your plants. The ladder shelf is sturdy, freestanding, flexible and can work in a tight space. And you can paint it a bright colour if you want it to pop out in a room of neutral hues.
Get your game on
Some of the extra time we spend indoors could be devoted to playing board games. To kick up your gaming skills to the next level, why not build your own game table? The Spruce generously offers plans for nine designs, including tables that have storage for game pieces, or are small and portable so you can move the game to wherever you want in your home.
Mount a desk to your wall
If you are working at home for the first time because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and you don’t have a lot of home office space, think about mounting a small desk on your wall. For a reasonable price, you can build your own wall-mounted desk for two, which won’t overpower the space if you need to put it in the living room or bedroom.
Hang your coffee mugs
If you want to put your caffeine habit on proud display, then take your coffee or tea mugs out of the cupboard and hang them from hooks on a rail on the wall, or under the cupboard. You can also create a DIY peg board, make your own coffee bar or use any vertical space you can find to hang the mugs, such as the side of a cabinet.
Paint your own faux-marble countertop
House Beautiful assures you that it is not that hard to create your own faux-painted marble countertop. Using a marble countertop paint kit, you can reproduce the look of “white limestone cut by thin, sinewy veins and plumes of grey quartz” found in Carrara marble. Follow the instructions and you are on the way to transforming an old, beat-up counter into something really fancy.
Create no-sew curtains
Want to create your own curtains but have no sewing skills? No problem. Instead use double-sided, semi-permanent fabric tape, whose adhesive works the same way a seam would. So get your curtain fabric of choice and then hang your rods, measure the fabric, cut it, tape your edges and hems, create the pocket and hang your masterpiece.
Construct an easy DIY fire pit
As the weather warms, it’s time to move from inside the house into the backyard. And nothing is cheerier than sitting around a crackling fire pit at night. To make your own doesn’t have to be difficult or expensive, using materials like brick, pavers, concrete and retaining wall block.
Peter Giffen, Espresso
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