We get a lot of fun reader projects sent to us, so we wanted to start sharing how awesomely talented our lovely readers are!

Today we wanted to share with you a closet-turned-bar renovation by our dear friend Lori, complete with a wine cork accent wall and backlit onyx shelving.

Materials: ¾” solid mahogany, ¾” mahogany plywood, 12” x 12” onyx tile, glass shelves, 2,000+ corks, straight pins, wine.

Since moving into our new house a few years ago, the space under our stairs constantly bugged me. Because of the builder’s limited creativity, any odd shaped or extra space in our house was turned into a closet. The area under the stairs has 7’ ceilings, and is big enough for 2-3 people, so it seemed like a missed design opportunity. Most people would be happy about having as much storage as possible. But, being the winos that we are, we decided to demo the biggest closet in our house and turn it into a wine showcase. Our biggest problem now is keeping it stocked.

While I love our house, it is a sea of right angles and straight planes. In the bar, I knew we had to introduce some curves- much to the dismay of our new builder (aka, Rob, my husband). The counter is made of solid mahogany, purchased at Houston Hardwoods. All the shelving below is clear finished mahogany plywood. The real show stopper is the backlit onyx tiles. The main goal was to cast a warm glow, and highlight our Iittala wine glass collection. The light source is a fluorescent tube mounted to the underside of the stairs. The tiles are mounted to a ¼” plexi-glass backer and then inset into a metal frame. The wine fridge is sitting on a rolling panel so that we can pull it out, and access all the storage that is left underneath the stairs. Just above the glass shelving is a flip door that hides all of our openers, and other not so stylish bar accessories.

Last but not least, is the cork wall. Again, because we are major winos, we had been saving corks over the course of our 11 year relationship. The wine bar justified saving them, and they added a great texture (and sound insulation for the recessed speaker in the ceiling). There are over 2,000 corks- pin mounted with straight pins. I know the quantity b/c I went through almost 3 boxes of pins (750 pins/box). Our Rosendahl wine tube is mounted into the corks in such a way that you can’t see the attachments, and it appears that the tube is floating. The wall is washed in incandescent light from a dimmable MR16.

Now we can enjoy our wino life in style. Who cares where our winter coats and suitcases go?!?!?

-Lori

If you have any cool DIY projects you’d like to share with us, we’d love to see them and who knows? They may end up on our blog!

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