Repurposed Bi-fold Doors into Bookcase

Here's a fun project I did a few weeks ago for a guest post on My Repurposed life. I thought I'd share it here as well for those who may have missed it. Here's what I started with

two bi-fold wood doors that I picked up at the Restore.

The first thing I did after removing all the hinges and handles was to router a channel into the doors for the back to fit into. I used 1/4" pine beadboard boards for the back. You know the kind that come wrapped up in packages at the big home stores. To determine the width of my bookcase I cut the tung off one of the beadboard boards and dry fit them all together. I measured then subtracted for the channels and cut my 1 x 4's accordingly.

The bi-folds doors are paneled and the spacers just happened to be the same size as a 1 x 4. To attach the sides and support the shelves I drilled pocket holes into some 1 x 4's then glued and screwed everything together.

I attached a 1 x 4 to the bottom front in the same way.

I attached the beadboard to the back with glue and nails.

The shelves I made by gluing and clamping together 1 x pine boards. I had to notch out the back corner of each shelf with my jig saw. The shelves were all secured to the bookcase with glue and nails.

I wanted more shelves than there were 1 x 4's so I used 3/8" x 2" trim to support the additional shelves. I glued and nailed them to the edges of the bi-fold doors and through the beadboard back.

For the top of the bookshelf I decided to router the edge of the top board to continue the look of the crown molding. I like big crown.

Because of the way the bi-fold doors are designed there was a gap between the crown and the middle part of the top of the door. I filled it by gluing and nailing a 1/4" dowel to the door. I think it ties in with the bead of the beadboard.

I finished the edges of the shelves off with some trim I also picked up at the Restore.

For the paint finish I started by priming the whole cabinet with oil based primer because the doors appeared to have been sealed with oil based poly. I could tell by the lovely yellowness of them. I decided to do a two tone as well as try a new technique I have been seeing all around the blogisphere. For the inside I used a flat latex Robins Egg Blue color. For the outside I tried the vaseline technique to get a chippy look.

The first coat was a layer of dark brown latex. Once that dried I randomly touched areas I wanted to look "chippy" with the vaseline. Paint wont stick to where you put the vaseline. I didn't go overboard with it because I didn't want it to end up looking like a spotted cow.

I liked the look but.... I'm so used to sanding to distress that I started sanding and then ended up sanding over the whole thing with my palm sander. I'm happy with how the finish turned out in the end. I finished the whole thing off with clear acrylic satin. I have been using chalk paint so much lately it was fun to play with good old latex again.