Wall Mounted TV Case {tutorial}

05 Feb

Posted under Tutorials
By Missy

Tutorial by Catherine @ CathGrace for her win of the Upcycle challenge of season 14

I am so excited to be here to share my wall mounted TV cabinet tutorial!

Since the theme was Upcycle, I began with 2 barn-wood frames that I bought at Hobby Lobby (I was pleasantly surprised by the speed at which they shipped them to Korea, as I got them in less then 2 weeks.)

The frames I chose were for a 14″ x 18″ picture, with an outside frame dimension of 16.75″ x 20.75″, I was pretty much looking for anything that would be bigger than my TV when the 2 frames were put together.

For the body of the case, I used 2 pallets that were given to me by a friend, (Thanks Susan!) I didn’t use all the wood in both pallets, but I needed both because the wide pieces that I needed were only on the ends of the pallet. (and both had some split pieces.)

I began by using a jigsaw to cut the edges of the wood off of the pallet, I could do this because none of my cuts needed to be longer than the wood I had left after cutting the ends off.

I then pried the center bar off from under the pieces I wanted to use.

Here are what my usable pieces looked like,

I don’t have any pictures of the next bit, because it wouldn’t have been safe to stop and take any, but I used a joiner, a planer, and a table saw to smooth some of the roughness off of the wood (I left the outside rougher, and the inside of the case smoother) I did this at the base wood shop up in Seoul. When I was done, I had 5 finished pieces of wood.

Here’s my cut list:

2 boards x 4.75″ by 20.75″ and a half inch thick for the sides.

1 board x 4.75″ by 32.25″ and a half inch thick for the top.

1 board x 4.25 by 32.25″ and a half inch thick for the bottom.

1 board x 2.50″ by 32.25″ and a half inch thick as the stabilizing and hanging bar.

I pre-drilled holes and then using wood glue in all the joints, I glued and screwed the frame all together with the sides on the outside of the frame, and the 2.50″ wide piece along the top back.

The bottom piece is the one that was .5″ narrower than the top piece, the reason it is narrower, is because you want to push the piece flush with the front, so there is a .5″ gap towards the back (this is so cords can hang out the bottom if you need them too.) I countersunk the screws and then used a dowel to cover over the screw heads. I glued the dowels in place, and then used a dremmel multimax tool to flush cut the dowels.

Next I placed the frames on top of the case, and used 4 hinges I bought off of ebay. I cannot even tell you how hard Korea is making crafting, I have no idea where to get hinges here, I am sure there is a place, but Korean’s aren’t really a DIY culture, and all of their stores are small specialty stores, so you have to hope you can find the wood store, or the screw store (neither of which I have found) and so hinge stores, not so much. Anyway, I found the hinges that I needed on Ebay for $15 shipped (which always makes me cringe, I know I can get these exact same hinges at Lowe’s for under $8 for 4.) I had already painted the frames black in this picture.

The paint for this project was an adventure too. I can’t get black paint here, they don’t mix any dark colors. so I ended up using left over chalkboard paint from my kitchen wall. I painted the hinges black too since I didn’t want them to be super shiny brass.

then I sanded the whole thing down heavily, so there was a lot of wood showing, and stained the whole thing in a dark walnut stain (one I brought with me in my craft supplies, I also don’t know where the stain store is…..)

Here’s what the side looks like all painted, sanded and stained, I love how the hinges turned out, and the texture that the pallet wood has!

For the glass that filled the frame, I cut pieces of glass that I picked up from a frame store, and foiled the edges (glass stuff was in my stash) and soldered it all together. My finished glass was .25″ smaller than the frame size to make sure it all fit alright.

next I cleaned the glass really well to get all the oil and flux off the glass so that I could silver leaf the back of the glass.

I would have preferred to use Looking Glass Spray Paint, but I can’t get it shipped to me in Korea (USPS is the only way we can get mail) so I used brush on sizing and silver leaf instead.

You can sort of see the sizing brush strokes through the front, but that doesn’t bother me, I also let some areas not get fully leafed to keep an antique glass feel. I painted the back of the glass black, and then used clear silicone to glue it into the frame. I decided to not add any other sort of back because I didn’t want to add any unnecessary weight to the doors.

as you can see, you can see the black through the silver leaf in some areas, not quite a mercury glass look, but I think an antique mirror effect was successfully achieved. I used an antiquing medium to make the solder lines go black.

I used wall anchors, and 2 screws through the back bar to hang the cabinet on the wall, and then I added 4 magnetic catches I got off Amazon to hold the doors shut. Lastly I finished the whole thing with a clear varnish (only on the outside, I might paint the inside a different color one day, when I have easy access to paint so I didn’t varnish it.) I like that it is wider than the TV, (didn’t really plan that, the frames dictated the size,) because we can access the power buttons, and all the ports that are on both sides, since we like to plug our phones into the TV to watch online stuff, and I think it’s better for venting the TV.

This picture has flash to show how shiny and reflective the silver leaf is.

Although it doesn’t quite reflect like a mirror.

you can see the cords hanging down the back in this picture, because we live in base housing, I can’t install anything through the walls so that the cords are hidden, but only a couple of inches show below the stand before Paul’s dresser starts, so it doesn’t bother me too much, and if we ever can hide the cords, you won’t be able to tell that the back has the .50″ slit across the bottom back.

I am pretty excited with how this case turned out, and it is sooo much prettier on the wall then just the TV!

Thanks for having me, and I hope you are inspired to make your own upcycled wall mounted TV cabinet, and I would love it if you would come visit me over at cathgrace!