Swing Shelf (Pottery Barn Kids Knock Off)

Last week I posted photos of the Kids Bathroom that I finished for the One Room Challenge Link Party.  Which by the way, if you haven’t had a chance, there are some pretty amazing rooms linked up that you should definitely check out!

One of the items in the room that I know a lot of people wanted more info on, was the Swing Shelf which is a Pottery Barn Kids knock off.  This rope shelf is super cute and I love it.  Unfortunately where it is positioned in the bathroom makes it super hard to photograph, it either has shadows or looks uneven when it is actually quite straight.  So excuse the poor photos, it’s the best I could do!

 

 

This was so easy to make and cost us less than $10.  We purchased a bag of sisal type rope in a bag from Home Depot for $5 and have enough rope left to make about 15 more of these shelves.   The good news is, I took a few photos during but the bad news is, I didn’t take enough for this tutorial.
Supplies:

1 (inch) x6 (inch) x3(feet)

some rope (we used Manila Rope 3/8 x 50 ft from Home Depot and only used about 6 feet total)

2 eye hooks

white paint

gel stain or regular stain would work too but you will have to experiment with that

 

This is the board we used, hubby cut some of the length off so measure where you want the shelf to go and cut to whatever length you need.

This is the rope we ended up using.  It was cheaper than the rope you can have cut to length so if we want to make more boards or just need some rope, now we have extra!

 

I stained the board with this Minwax Water Based Wood Sheen Rubbing Stain & Finish in Colonial Walnut.  It dries in one hour which I love and is less messy than actual stain.  Using a white cloth I wiped it on the board, making it slightly darker in some spots and lighter in others.  I did both the top and bottom and all sides, then let dry for an hour.

After the stain was dry, I put some white latex paint in a cool whip container and added some water, mixed it together until it was pretty thinned out.  I used a chip brush (from Home Depot for about $.60) to apply the watered down white paint.  I kept a white cloth nearby so I could wipe it off right away, letting it give me the gray weathered look I was going for.  Again, I let some soak in more in certain areas and less in others.

Here is the board after I added the white watered down paint.

I then used some fine grit sandpaper and sanded a few areas to make them lighter and less worn looking, letting some of the original wood color come through.

During his lunch break I had the hubby drill some holes for the rope.  We just guessed and did about 2 inches in from the ends and around 3/4 of an inch from the front and back of the boards.  He used a 1/2 inch drill bit for the size rope we used.   And yes, we drilled the board in the kitchen off the counter top with a random one dollar bill in the photo.  We are rebels.

After drilling all 4 holes for the rope, we then measured the rope out and cut two separate pieces, one for each side.  And because we are great tutorial people, we forgot how long we made the rope but the hubby thinks it was 36 inches.  You may want yours longer or shorter so I suggest not cutting the rope until you figure out the length you need to achieve for the right height is what we would suggest.

Now for the important part, make sure you don’t tie both knots because you need to feed one end of the rope through the eye hook first!  Repeat for the second side of the shelf and then it’s on to the fun part, styling!

So there you have it, how we made a Swing Shelf for less than $10!