Were trying to decide if we should also Pax and then add customization like this as well. | Made by Lur, 20 Inspiring IKEA Pax Closet Makeovers - JFY, Owner's Closet Inspiration and Design Board The Wooden Tangerine, https://rstyle.me/+7C5F0X5LVSTqKyeaJ3pHgQ, Hacking the IKEA Pax into a Fully Custom Closet Erin Kestenbaum Global Blog, Master Closet Remodel Alexis Strickland, 41 Best Closet Organization Ideas to Keep Your Space Neat and Tidy, Guncelkal.net - See how an interior designer hacked a basic Ikea Pax wardrobe into a lush, inky blue walk-in closet, https://www.ikea.com/ca/en/p/variera-cover-cap-white-00226315/, IKEA PAX Wardrobe Hacks - Hana's Happy Home. A little known secret is that IKEA sells packs of plugs designed to hide the many, many holes in the Pax system that are used for shelving, etc. Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. We also have an ikea PAX closet and Im having trouble finding baskets that fit in that little top shelf. Were so thrilled with how it came together! Allow the paint to cure for a day or two before installing the drawer fronts. Just curious how it has held up. Did you tape off all the rails etc when you sprayed? Im a total beginner when it comes to DIY and may be an off-topic question, but would like to add a pegboard to the side of my PAX sliding door closet. That being said, having grown our skills today, we would potentially tackle the full build-out from scratch today (if we had the dedicated time), just because we love a new challenge ha! Do you think it is possible to add an IKEA pegboard to it? Hi! I know, were on IKEAhackers.net, but it would have been close to impossible to assemble and put up the cabinets, even if I cut them to size. But, once you get the hang of it, the closet wasnt too different from spraying walls or furniture. Im sure many people make the same mistake though. Did you just add the fronts to increase the depth of the drawers, or did you remove the original PAX drawer fronts and install your own? Because we knew we were going to have rattan boxes on a top shelf, we knew the cords would be invisible. Then we installed the shelf and ran the puck light through it on each unit. If yes, how do we do it? This is gorgeous. Now the closet looks super custom and you can see how all components came together in a space that feels much more high-end than a basic IKEA hack! Interesting.. so I just installed 1 drawer and they are flush.. maybe the new ones do and the old ones didnt. Thank you!!!! SUPER helpful as I am in the process of planning my own Ikea hack wardrobe. Just wondering what the drawers look like when opened! We are doing a similar closet design now, inspired by your amazing blog!! How did you move the electrical outlet? What advantage did buy the Pax units give you? Consider this page permanently bookmarked in my DIY list! On the right side (with the shoes), we took out all the shelves, including the adjustment pieces and sprayed both the shelves and the plastic things that hold the shelves up separately. Erin, this is truly outstanding work. The closet paint is Farrow and Ball Inchyra Blue in Modern Eggshell and the bedroom is Benjamin Moore Smoke in the Regal Pearl finish. The shallower drawer installed perfectly into the deeper unit and looks exactly the same as the other drawers from the front . Huge props and thank you for sharing. The light switch on the side of the cabinetswhat type of clearance was needed inside of the drawer for an electrical box? Is there a specific reason why you went with 1/2 inch thick vs 3/4 inch thick? Did you have to find extensions for your lights? Correcting now! It looks great with the shelves (we did that on the other side, where the shoes, etc. So we replaced it with one of the higher end Ikea kitchens with the lighting system. Absolutely stunning and inspiring, as just about everyone has said. Weve been thrilled with both paints, so far! Finally, I fixed the base to the wall at four points using 40mm angle irons. I absolutely love the color choice! What an amazing job! Thanks for the detailed blog post about this . We bought a spray gun on a whim and it isnt really designed for big projects like the walls, but weve made it work anyway, so Im not sure I have the best recommendation :/ (its the Wagner Home Decor Sprayer). Youre right, they are 24 not 29 units. Can you please explain and if possible share some pictures of the build up in processlike an area of the base that was built up next to an area that was not? This inspired me. If youve ever watched the Flatpack Empire, (all about Ikea). This is where the 90 degree angled screwdriver came in handy, as I could otherwise never reach between the ceiling and the top of the cabinets. Hi! Let me know what your thoughts are in the comments below. Using the vanity in our adjacent bathroom as the guide for how we wanted the drawer fronts to look, we opted for a flat front, which is a nice streamlined look and also lower effort than a shaker style. The sources are actually all linked in the reveal post of this space here (https://erinkestenbaum.com/2018/11/07/one-room-challenge-fall-2018-the-reveal-week-six-master-bedroom-closet/), where the ceiling light is the Rye Flushmount from Hudson Valley Lighting and the ceiling wallpaper is Farrow and Balls Closet Stripe in Downpipe. Using small strips of MDF, I made sure the base was perfectly straight and level from wall to wall and also back to front. Hope that helps! I absolutely adored the blue, custom cabinetry and decided I was going to figure out a way to get a similar look in my own house with a non-custom budget. This is where things start to really begin to look custom. (Yes, not basketball, netball). Your closet turned out beautiful. Hi Erin, For reference, the room is 14.6 long by 6.5 wide, and we opted for the deeper IKEA Pax units on one side (23 deep) and shallower units on the other wall (13 deep), which allowed for a wide walkway between the two units. Good luck! Once the base was done, it was time to line up the cabinets. Can you clarify the steps: Did you actually remove them and wallpaper the entire MDF, or did you take the time to wallpaper each section to shape/size? Did you screw the new fronts of the drawers to the old ones? Hi Erin! We just double prime with your recommended primer and will be painting soon. Im trying to do this in our house; we will be going for the 201cm high pax wardrobes too but I cant see to find the same height wardrobe doors on ikea. Ive shown this project to so many people, it really blows me away. Ive been designing cabinetry for 30 years and this is stunning. This is the most stunning IKEA hack Ive seen to date. Dark green, really? We werent sure how the laminate would sand, so we opted for the plugs instead but I have seen people fill and sand since without any apparent issue. Let me know if you need further clarification. We couldnt use nails here, because there was no solid surface for them to grip into or they might have become visible on the inside of the units. The Ikea Pax is frequently posted all over Instagram and Pinterest. Your closet is awesome, Erin! You can see that the color looks different, but once it was all painted, youre none the wiser. Any suggestions? Did you think about that when you were designing the closet? Im wondering what you used to get the wall paper to stick to the back board? In order to make the lights look very custom, we recessed them into the front of the top shelf in every unit. I was really flummoxed about this step. The key is to prime with a shellac based primer (specifically this one) and you will have no trouble at all painting over the IKEA finish. IKEA does indeed sell the L-shape divider (called the Komplement frame divider) that allows you to install the narrowest drawers in a wider frame. Ok your ikea hack closet is just stunning! ), and the drawer bottoms seem more substantial than on most of their other products? Just curious they look very smooth from the drawer open pic. It would be very helpful to me if you could confirm width of pax wardrobe and depth? This looks stunning!! Sure! A great work you have done, and Im planning to do something similar.. but why such a bad color? Just found your blog and LOVE it! Thanks for the info. Frost the glass panels so you dont see whats inside. At that point in time, we had never built cabinetry before, so it was pretty intimidating to do so and would have taken us A LOT more time to build out. Next up, was installing the baseboards to the front of the units. So inspiring and such fun to marvel! We set up our laser level (weve named it our tool of the year since it has made our lives SO much easier) to keep our baseboards level. Hope that helps! When it comes to paint, make sure to go with a paint that is rated for cabinetry, since the closet gets a lot of hands on use. In my research, I discovered that lots of people have hacked the IKEA Pax or IKEA Billy systems to create a built-in look. 
I initially thought it looked green until you mentioned the shade name, wow! Btw, is there any way that a pair of Besta unit doors can be used to cover the top part of the frame of a single PAX wardrobe frame, but the bottom part housing the drawers could be left as is, or covered with a separate set of hinged doors from the Besta series?? Unfortunately no the primer step is listed after the wallpaper. I thought as soon as we started taking out the old kitchen, itd probably show its age and just start falling apart. , Hello! I was thinking about installing the wardrobe frames without the cardboard back and just letting my shiplap walls show through the back. Is this what you used for your project? On the sides, we added flat panels of wood to cover the gaps between the Pax units and the wall. First I fixed them together and to the wall using the standard IKEA methods. around the sink, stove and dishwasher, that the kitchen would not last long. The choice was either to remove the wardrobes, extend the plasterboard ceiling, replace the carpet, plaster the walls and ceiling, paint the whole room and then put in freestanding cabinets, or take a cue from Andre and make my own PAX built-in wardrobe. So, I tracked down paintable faux grasscloth wallpaper and installed it on the back wall of the wardrobe units. Stunning closet!!! Your closet is beautiful and been such a help because our soon to be closet is also 6 and a half feet wide by 10. We sanded the drawer fronts down and then brought them into the room. How exactly did you attach the poplar drawer fronts to the PAX drawers? The PAX system is great but it absolutely leaves little to be desired on the esthetic side. Thank you for sharing. I am wondering if I could do the same but I have two windows facing the entrance door and I dont really want to cut one off. Was putting a shelf divider on top of a shelf an issue? It now holds all my tools and the old kitchen countertop is a great work surface almost at the 18yr mark now. We continued the wire through the ceiling (we have attic access and just drilled a hole on each side of the closet and fed it through ). Hi Erin, just coming across this post and its great! It looks like oubhave 2-3 feet in the middle? Kind of a silly questionhow did you go about exchanging the clothing rods (wood dowels)? COPYRIGHT 2022 IKEAHACKERS.NET | IKEA is a registered trademark of Inter-IKEA Systems B.V. Also..I have one more unit to put together, I am thinking about trying to get very thin plywood instead of using the back with the PAX system, (cut to size of course). Is it separating at all from the melamine? May in inquire as to what brand/finish/paint you used to spray the color in both your closet and master bedroom? When you attached the front trim using a finish nailer, did it not split the idea frame wood (since its not real hard wood and not that thick) Why did you have to do this? (Thank you for making the correction on priming) how were you able to get the wallpaper to fit so perfectly after you assembled the wardrobe being that its hard to reach the back w/o stepping on the bottom of the unit to reach the back? These are the baskets on the shallow wall of units (right side): https://rstyle.me/n/decpswcd8gx. We have a 37 walkway and its a really good size it doesnt feel cramped at all! It is complex for me to understand, simply because I cannot visualize it. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Then you wont need to worry about opening both doors. We set a routing depth equal to the thickness of the puck light, so it would be completely flush with the lower surface of the shelf. I filled the screw holes with plaster (twice) and the panel gaps with silicone sealant. Quick questionif we used your guide to trimming out a Pax, but we kept the drawer fronts the same, how do you think we could we go about making sure the drawers are level with the added trim, since there wouldnt be an extra drawer front and washer? I will use the method you described of using washers. Thank you for the details and the lovely photos. I did only one coat this time, leaving it outside for 4-6 hours afterwards, and the smell was barely noticeable when I brought the shelves inside at the end of the day. For the light switch, we did indeed have that same issue and routed the electrical through the back and side of the unit we built a box to house the electrical and then added a drawer on the front thats designed for the shallower pax units, which allowed it to be flush on the front with the other drawers but also gave us space behind the shallow drawer for all the electrical. Then, I made the depth slightly less than the cabinets themselves, so the finishing plinth would recess just a millimeter or so backward. I am using your very well documented and detailed project diary as my project bible if you will. I wish you had a youtube channel and 2. are you available for hire? Hi! AH-MAZING!! We covered the interior of the drawers sections (including the rails) with paper and taped off the area (we didnt want to waste paint on the interior that nobody would ever see). Rose just wanted to address your comment on the Ikea particle board in 2003 my wife and I needed a new kitchen in a hurry, thanks to a burst pipe. Have you had any problems with the wallpaper you used to cover the back wall seams? hey! Did you insert 1 rods into the IKEA holders or did you add your own? This is like the best hack ever!! Im scared a project like this would be too ambitious for me. To install the drawer fronts, we taped the washers to hold them in place, as it is next to impossible to slip them in between the drawers and the wood front. Hi Ashley! We again used the same Fashion Forward crown moulding from Metrie and installed it along the top edge of all the wardrobe units. For the paint, we used Farrow and Ball Inchyra Blue in the Modern Eggshell finish, and its one of my most favourite moody colours of all time. Why did you you have to build new ones? Since the drawer fronts werent quite flush with the added frame, we used washers between the IKEA Pax drawers and the wood fronts at each screw location to bump the drawer front out slightly to be flush. Hope that helps! did you bring wire. This closet came in at under $3K if thats helpful info, I know that a California closets would have been 3x more at a minimum, so it was an easy choice for us, but we didnt hire a carpenter, so I dont know what it would have cost in labor. Hello Erin! 
So beautifully done. Next, I screwed the sections of plasterboard onto the metal stud profiles, leaving at least a 2mm gap on all sides, to be filled with silicone sealant. Last but not the least, maybe Im the only one, but I just wish they offered similar gleaming metallic surface finishes in the closet frames and doors, as in their Besta units/Kitchen cabinets. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Mother. Once we routed the holes for the lights, we drilled a hole straight through to accommodate the cord for the puck light itself. Thank you!! Do you have any advice on when to paint the cabinets? 2 correct, the drawers dont sit flush to the pax frame. 
Most people hid the drawers by adding doors on the wardrobe units, but we didnt have the space, or the desire to add so many unnecessary cabinet doors to our space. Thanks! For this, we used some scrap strips of 1/8th inch tempered hardboard to bring the shelf up to level and secured it with screws. Thank you so much! Amazing! The closet is a STUNNER! Ive seen a million Ike hacks! That paragraph under the picture in #6. Its more of a cost friendly alternative to some other built in wardrobe options, its easily customised and has different colour options available. 
Where did you add the strips to? We assumed the same thing until we went deep into the ikea hackers forums and discovered how important the back panel is, and thus settled on how to mask the backs rather than do away with them. If so where? So much paper wasted! You are my hero, this is the most beautiful ikea hack that Ive ever seen, and your house is just beautiful. We have one, but it was pretty inexpensive and goes everywhere, so works fine when you want to paint a whole room, but not so much when you are trying to paint cabinets.
I initially thought it looked green until you mentioned the shade name, wow! Btw, is there any way that a pair of Besta unit doors can be used to cover the top part of the frame of a single PAX wardrobe frame, but the bottom part housing the drawers could be left as is, or covered with a separate set of hinged doors from the Besta series?? Unfortunately no the primer step is listed after the wallpaper. I thought as soon as we started taking out the old kitchen, itd probably show its age and just start falling apart. , Hello! I was thinking about installing the wardrobe frames without the cardboard back and just letting my shiplap walls show through the back. Is this what you used for your project? On the sides, we added flat panels of wood to cover the gaps between the Pax units and the wall. First I fixed them together and to the wall using the standard IKEA methods. around the sink, stove and dishwasher, that the kitchen would not last long. The choice was either to remove the wardrobes, extend the plasterboard ceiling, replace the carpet, plaster the walls and ceiling, paint the whole room and then put in freestanding cabinets, or take a cue from Andre and make my own PAX built-in wardrobe. So, I tracked down paintable faux grasscloth wallpaper and installed it on the back wall of the wardrobe units. Stunning closet!!! Your closet is beautiful and been such a help because our soon to be closet is also 6 and a half feet wide by 10. We sanded the drawer fronts down and then brought them into the room. How exactly did you attach the poplar drawer fronts to the PAX drawers? The PAX system is great but it absolutely leaves little to be desired on the esthetic side. Thank you for sharing. I am wondering if I could do the same but I have two windows facing the entrance door and I dont really want to cut one off. Was putting a shelf divider on top of a shelf an issue? It now holds all my tools and the old kitchen countertop is a great work surface almost at the 18yr mark now. We continued the wire through the ceiling (we have attic access and just drilled a hole on each side of the closet and fed it through ). Hi Erin, just coming across this post and its great! It looks like oubhave 2-3 feet in the middle? Kind of a silly questionhow did you go about exchanging the clothing rods (wood dowels)? COPYRIGHT 2022 IKEAHACKERS.NET | IKEA is a registered trademark of Inter-IKEA Systems B.V. Also..I have one more unit to put together, I am thinking about trying to get very thin plywood instead of using the back with the PAX system, (cut to size of course). Is it separating at all from the melamine? May in inquire as to what brand/finish/paint you used to spray the color in both your closet and master bedroom? When you attached the front trim using a finish nailer, did it not split the idea frame wood (since its not real hard wood and not that thick) Why did you have to do this? (Thank you for making the correction on priming) how were you able to get the wallpaper to fit so perfectly after you assembled the wardrobe being that its hard to reach the back w/o stepping on the bottom of the unit to reach the back? These are the baskets on the shallow wall of units (right side): https://rstyle.me/n/decpswcd8gx. We have a 37 walkway and its a really good size it doesnt feel cramped at all! It is complex for me to understand, simply because I cannot visualize it. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Then you wont need to worry about opening both doors. We set a routing depth equal to the thickness of the puck light, so it would be completely flush with the lower surface of the shelf. I filled the screw holes with plaster (twice) and the panel gaps with silicone sealant. Quick questionif we used your guide to trimming out a Pax, but we kept the drawer fronts the same, how do you think we could we go about making sure the drawers are level with the added trim, since there wouldnt be an extra drawer front and washer? I will use the method you described of using washers. Thank you for the details and the lovely photos. I did only one coat this time, leaving it outside for 4-6 hours afterwards, and the smell was barely noticeable when I brought the shelves inside at the end of the day. For the light switch, we did indeed have that same issue and routed the electrical through the back and side of the unit we built a box to house the electrical and then added a drawer on the front thats designed for the shallower pax units, which allowed it to be flush on the front with the other drawers but also gave us space behind the shallow drawer for all the electrical. Then, I made the depth slightly less than the cabinets themselves, so the finishing plinth would recess just a millimeter or so backward. I am using your very well documented and detailed project diary as my project bible if you will. I wish you had a youtube channel and 2. are you available for hire? Hi! AH-MAZING!! We covered the interior of the drawers sections (including the rails) with paper and taped off the area (we didnt want to waste paint on the interior that nobody would ever see). Rose just wanted to address your comment on the Ikea particle board in 2003 my wife and I needed a new kitchen in a hurry, thanks to a burst pipe. Have you had any problems with the wallpaper you used to cover the back wall seams? hey! Did you insert 1 rods into the IKEA holders or did you add your own? This is like the best hack ever!! Im scared a project like this would be too ambitious for me. To install the drawer fronts, we taped the washers to hold them in place, as it is next to impossible to slip them in between the drawers and the wood front. Hi Ashley! We again used the same Fashion Forward crown moulding from Metrie and installed it along the top edge of all the wardrobe units. For the paint, we used Farrow and Ball Inchyra Blue in the Modern Eggshell finish, and its one of my most favourite moody colours of all time. Why did you you have to build new ones? Since the drawer fronts werent quite flush with the added frame, we used washers between the IKEA Pax drawers and the wood fronts at each screw location to bump the drawer front out slightly to be flush. Hope that helps! did you bring wire. This closet came in at under $3K if thats helpful info, I know that a California closets would have been 3x more at a minimum, so it was an easy choice for us, but we didnt hire a carpenter, so I dont know what it would have cost in labor. Hello Erin! So beautifully done. Next, I screwed the sections of plasterboard onto the metal stud profiles, leaving at least a 2mm gap on all sides, to be filled with silicone sealant. Last but not the least, maybe Im the only one, but I just wish they offered similar gleaming metallic surface finishes in the closet frames and doors, as in their Besta units/Kitchen cabinets. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Mother. Once we routed the holes for the lights, we drilled a hole straight through to accommodate the cord for the puck light itself. Thank you!! Do you have any advice on when to paint the cabinets? 2 correct, the drawers dont sit flush to the pax frame. Most people hid the drawers by adding doors on the wardrobe units, but we didnt have the space, or the desire to add so many unnecessary cabinet doors to our space. Thanks! For this, we used some scrap strips of 1/8th inch tempered hardboard to bring the shelf up to level and secured it with screws. Thank you so much! Amazing! The closet is a STUNNER! Ive seen a million Ike hacks! That paragraph under the picture in #6. Its more of a cost friendly alternative to some other built in wardrobe options, its easily customised and has different colour options available. Where did you add the strips to? We assumed the same thing until we went deep into the ikea hackers forums and discovered how important the back panel is, and thus settled on how to mask the backs rather than do away with them. If so where? So much paper wasted! You are my hero, this is the most beautiful ikea hack that Ive ever seen, and your house is just beautiful. We have one, but it was pretty inexpensive and goes everywhere, so works fine when you want to paint a whole room, but not so much when you are trying to paint cabinets.