Ikea Shelf Hack: Turning Ordinary into Gold Extraordinary

Hello, friends! Ikea is a funny place. It is a place that I hate, and it is a place that I love. I hate it because sometimes they have items that are cheaply made and of poor quality. (I haven’t owned an Ikea dresser yet that didn’t have the drawers bowing quite soon after being filled.) But on the other hand, I love Ikea because you can get such a great deal in some departments, and there is a lot of opportunity to improve on their items with DIY projects. And did I mention the candles? I mean, you can’t get a better deal than 20-hour burning Omtalad candles for 79 cents.

Today I bring you a quick 10 minute Ikea hack for their inexpensive Ekby Järpen wall shelf. We purchased two of these shelves to hold decorative items and dishes in our dining room. We chose this beautiful dark black/brown color for the shelf itself, which contrasts nicely with our light gray walls. But those aluminum brackets? Not working for this gold-loving gal.

I used three coats of matte gold Rust-Oleum spray paint to spray the brackets before installation. Alternatively, you could use a shinier gold color, or other metallic color such as copper or bronze if that fits in more with your decor.

The one issue with this is that the gold spray paint will strip off from the screws during installation. To fix this, you can spray a bit of the gold spray paint onto a paper plate and use a small art paint brush to fill in a layer of paint on the screws after the shelf is installed. We chose to leave the screws silver because I like just a little bit of contrast with my metallics.

Voila! This super easy fix turned a boring $16.99 Ikea shelf into something that really fits in with our dining room decor.

What do you guys think? Let me know below in the comments, and tag #thecharmingdetroiter if you use this method in your own home!