Between the Rafters: From a China Cabinet to a Bookcase

When I first bought my house my Grandmother gave me a dining room table and a matching china cabinet. I didn't have room for the china cabinet so it went into storage in the basement. I tried to sell the china cabinet multiple times but couldn't find a buyer so I decided to put it to good use. As a bookcase. You see, the top of the china cabinet wasn't actually attached to the bottom so that you could use the piece as either a china cabinet or a buffet. The top part merely sat on the bottom. Pretty ingenious huh?

Here is the top part of the china cabinet before. Notice that it doesn't have a bottom as the top of the buffet would have been the bottom. It also had three doors but I neglected to take a picture before I took off the other two. (I also neglected to take a picture of the complete china cabinet.)

The top was also unfinished as it would have been too high to see once it was on the buffet bottom. It does have a light which I decided to leave in place.

To start I needed a bottom so two 1 x 8's were cut to size and attached. Of course this left a large crack where the two were joined. Since I had a piece of beadboard lying around from an earlier project we cut it to size, flipped it upside down, and glued it to the top of the new boards so as to have a smooth bottom for the bookcase.To finish the top we put boards across first to support the weight should I decide I wanted to set something on top of the bookcase. Then we cut another piece of the beadboard to size, flipped it upside down and attached it so as to have a smooth top. We also made a small indention for the light cord in the back board. Here are the bracings.

Next I filled in the holes where the door hinges had been with wood putty, gave the piece a light sanding and went to work painting. The inside I painted Woodsy Scent by Clark and Kensington. You might recall that this is the same color I painted my nightstand.

I painted the piece itself and the shelving a light grey called Baby Elephant, also a Clark and Kensington color (thanks to Ace Hardware for all the free samples they gave away recently! :-) ) The feet were purchased for $1 each at a local antique fair. I opted not to glaze the new bookcase. And here she is completed!!