My brain has a tendency to look at furniture and think, “What else could this be?” Our family has been on a journey this past year – we wanted to move houses, and logistically, it worked best for us to move into a rental while we sold our house and looked for a new one. I enjoyed the challenge of setting up our rental house using things we already had! One of my favorite “hacks” was turning this set of IKEA Liatorp bookcases, which had been in my craft room and then Kai’s bedroom, into dining room display shelves, including a dry bar.

Here’s what you’ll need:

• Bookcases. Mine are IKEA Liatorp
• Wallpaper to line the back of the shelves. This is the peel-and-stick wallpaper I used, though the lighter blue color looks like it might not be available anymore. I love it in navy, too!
• Plastic mirror tiles for the back of your bar. I used plastic tiles, so I could safely trim them to fit the shelf. The edges aren’t perfect, but it gives an antique look. I also needed to use a table saw to trim the shelves that are in front of the mirrors, so they would fit

I also used the dining room as my craft space, so I hid lots of supplies in these decorative boxes and baskets!

As we get ready to move in to our new home, this was actually one item that I decided not to bring with us. While I was sad to part with it, I am also a bit excited to know that one of my DIYs is out in the world brightening up someone else’s dining room!

Wish me luck with packing!

Julie AKA “Jewels”