Upcycling

We usually try to reuse as much of our stuff as we can, rather than buying new (well, ok...new to us, as most stuff comes from boot sales anyway), its down to shortage of cash as we usually spending it on more important stuff (plumbing, windows ect) so general everyday household stuff get shunted down the priority list.

As we are getting close to finishing up the bathroom, I have had to start thinking about practical stuff not just where pipes will go. We have an amazing lack of storage in this house as its pretty small and we have a phenomenal amount of art equipment and car parts packed in here with us! We don't have an airing cupboard so we have nowhere to store towels, I have in the past used a lovely Lloyd Loom chest but when we moved house we realised it wouldn't fit in the bathroom. So I had to come up with another option. Another peice we had brought with us from the old house was the really lovely old wine crate that we used to use as a coffee table.

It was bought from a junk shop in Bath back in 2009 and has had several uses over the years from housing actually wine in the kitchen to coffee table. I cant remember how much we paid, I have a feeling it was around the £12 mark.

So a couple of weekends ago I decided that it would actually make a great little store for towels. I started by removing the bottle sections inside it...

...and giving it a damn good hoover out.

We then gave the inside two coats of satin wood paint to seal it and protect the towels from the rough wood.

These crates are not poshly built and the wood it usually pretty wooly and rough, it does sort of add to its charm though (you definitely don't get this sort of thing from Ikea!). I also bought some rubber casters from eBay (£9.90) and fitted them so I can pop in out from under the sink easily.

Then I just added towels!

I'm really happy with how it came out, it should be really useful and if we change our minds we can always reuse it for something else later. I do like a quick cheap project!