We have been improving our house in many ways and saving money by DIY. I wanted a nice office space in the back bedroom so that we could stop using our dining room table to get our work done. I also wanted it to be functional for 2 people. Built-in 2 person office spaces can cost over $15,000! This one cost about $1,500. I also didn’t want to have to drill any holes in the wall or cut out the baseboards, so this project worked perfectly for our space.

Before the Renovation

Here is what the room looked like before the renovation:

After the Renovation

There were so many things I wanted to change about this room. I wanted to change the color of the walls, the flooring (I hate carpet!), the closet and turn it into a functional office. Which we did. Now it looks more like this (same angle):

I had looked up DIY office spaces online and a lot of them call for you to cut out your baseboards to install cabinets. I wanted my office to look like a built-in, but not be built-in. For the cabinets I used Ikea because they are the perfect height and you can pick and choose pretty much any style and color that you want. I went to the store to order to make sure I was  getting exactly what I needed. I  just had to assemble the cabinets, place them exactly where I needed them and set the table tops on top! 

If you are doing just one desk for yourself you only need 1 cabinet on each end of the table. That’s the great thing about this project. If you want only one desk space, lose the middle cabinet and buy only 1 tabletop!

List of Cabinets to Buy

The base cabinets can come 15 or 24 inches deep and there are multiple widths. They are all 30 inches in height which is perfect for the desk height. You don’t want to add the base to it (like you would in the kitchen) or it would be too high. The wider you go the more expensive it is. Also the more drawers you have the more expensive it is. The width is up to you, but I thought the wider cabinet in the middle would make the division between desk spaces more prominent.

Left Far Cabinet

L far cabinet: Sektion base frame in white with shelves  (15 x 15 x 30), Bodbyn off-white door (15 x 30). This cabinet is used to house my husband’s computer. It was the perfect size, we just had to cut out a hole in the back to let all of the wires through.

Middle Cabinet

Middle cabinet: Sektion base cabinet frame (18 x 15 x 30)  in white with 3 drawers, Bodbyn drawer front off-white (one 18 x5, one 18 x 10 and one 18 x 15). There is not much we could do to avoid the line of separation between the 2 table top pieces. Notice how we made the bottom drawer look like a cabinet by switching the handle position.

Right Far Cabinet

R far cabinet: Sketion base cabinet frame (15 x 15 x 30) in white with 3 drawers, Bodbyn drawer front off white (one 15 x 5, one 15 x 10 and one 15 x  15)

Assembly

The assembly was tough. They have instructions on exactly how to do it, but it took me a few days. The hardest part is assembling the drawers. My hands were so tired after screwing in all of the components that make the drawer functional.

Handles

The handles I used were Tag. I had to buy 4 packs of 2 as I had 7 drawers. When installing the handles you need to drill your own holes through the cabinet door, this is where Adam came in to assist.  We measured the width between the holes in the handle and marked the same distance on the drawer. It was tough to get an accurate drill so sometimes we just had to make the hole a little wider to make sure we could get the screw in!    

Table Top

For the table top I used 2 for each desk space. I was cutting space pretty close and thought we may have to cut the tables to be shorter. In the end it did not have to cut down any of the pieces, but make sure you measure your space to make sure you have enough room for all of this! It ends up being 148 inches long which is 12 1/3 feet. If you are doing 1 desk space it is 6 1/6 feet long.

Table top: Hammarp countertop in oak (74 x 1 1/8)

When placing the table top on the bases we had to make sure that the bases were centered enough so that the weight of the back of the table would not cause it to tip over. The bases are only 15 inches in depth (if you want to avoid this problem get the 24 inch depth) and the table top is 24 inches deep. So the table top comes about a 1/2 inch over the base, but it still looks good! And we have enough space behind the cabinet for wires.

DIY Wall Shelving

Now for the wall space I found a neat DIY project on Pinterest from 7th House on the Left. We followed the instructions exactly except for the size of the wood. We used 2 x 8ft long (2 x 10 inch) boards and had Home Depot cut them in half to make 4 x 4ft boards.

We made sure the metal pipes were secured into wall at the studs and it came out to be pretty even over our desk spaces.

I’m still working on adding decorations, but I think it’s coming along well!

Accessories

The office chairs are White Modern Ribbed High Back Executive PU Leather Office Chairs that I found for $100 on ebay.

The floormat is the Floortex Ultimat Polycarbinate Smooth Back Chair Mat for hard floors that I found on Amazon. It is very important that we protect our new wood floors as they were quite an investment!

The decorations on the shelves are mostly from Ross and Marshall’s. They always have cute trinkets that you can make work for a space on a budget. I thought the shelves were a great spot to show off our college degrees as well.

Congratulations!

And after all that hard work you deserve a glass of wine. Try this Pancake Cellars 2013 Big Day White from Trader Joe’s. It is a blend of various white grapes with the heaviest portions being Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc. It’s a great wine for the price ($5) and tastes nice a fruity. This will not break the bank and will help you celebrate your achievement.