Plans to Build a Magazine Rack, So Easy I Could Do It

Some projects require more creativity than carpentry skills. I learned this recently when I encountered a couple of unique projects. I found two different sets of plans to build a magazine rack . The one was fairly complicated and involved all sorts of measuring, power tools and devices that I had never heard of before. The other plan, however, was something that even a novice, such as myself, could accomplish with ease

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My plan involved an old ladder, some screws, paint and four 1 x 4 pieces of lumber precut to be four inches long (making them 1x4x4). First, using a saw (a tool I know), I cut the ladder to length, three feet long. I left the rungs in place, and sawed the wood at either end of its supports, leaving it open-ended. Then, I scraped off old paint and applied a coat of my preferred color. I sanded and then painted the four square wood pieces, too and let them dry.

Then, using a battery-powered drill/driver, I drilled on hole in each of the four ends of the ladder’s sides, near the end of each of the support poles. I also drilled a hole in the center of each of the four squares as directed in my plans to build a magazine rack . Using a pencil, I marked the spots on my wall for hanging the rack. I figured out where to place the plates (square pieces) and marked those spots. Finally, I lined up the hole in the ladder’s support, the hole in the wooden plate and the mark on the wall and put the screw into it. Soon all four corners were supported and the ladder hung on the wall with a one-inch space between the rungs and the wall behind.

When complete, the ladder hung on the wall and I could drape my magazines over it so the covers showed. It gave a nice folksy appeal to the guest bathroom where I placed it. I also got a kick out of completing a do-it-yourself project on my own!