# WIP: Fitted Wardrobes (finished)



## joiner_sim (16 May 2009)

_The latest of my WIPs can be found on http://www.joinersim.vze.com_







This is a work-in-progress that will be carried out, outside of the workshop and built on site for one of my family members. I am using 44x44mm PAR softwood for all my main frame work. I am also using 12x32mm PAR softwood for door stops and other bits and pieces. I am going to be using 18mm MDF for panels, shelves and doors....The doors I plan on beading to make artificial panels. All of the MDF has been ordered, cut-to-size, hopefully this will be a good decision and should speed the work up slightly. The finish will be painted. 
Below, shows the size/dimensions of the design.






All the materials have been ordered today (16/5/09) and I should be getting started with it all over the bank holiday weekend. I just hope it all goes okay and ordering the MDF pre-cut was the right decision! Watch this space...


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## jhwbigley (16 May 2009)

just hope that they cut it square :lol: 

John


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## joiner_sim (16 May 2009)

Well, the guys I have ordered the MDF from are the ones I recommended on here a few days ago. http://www.mahoneysdiy.co.uk/ I have been down to there shop before and they have an excellent ELCON wall saw, so it does cut accuratley. http://www.daltonsmachines.com/elcon-vertical-panel-saws.html This is the same saw I use in the commercial workshop I work in, so I know it works well.


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## jhwbigley (16 May 2009)

yes, with a well set up wall saw like that they should be all spot on. i remember once getting my dad to cut up some mdf for me, he did it with the handheld circular saw free hand, they where quiet a bit out :shock: 


John


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## joiner_sim (16 May 2009)

haha :lol: thats why i've decided to get it all pre-cut and delivered. 

:arrow: yes, I could have probably got it all pre-cut at the workshop I work in, but due to the way things are currently in the workshop, I felt it was best to give the work to my second choice.

I will be bringing my circular saw with me incase I need to do some trimming of the materials! But at least all the major cuttings have been done for me!


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## joiner_sim (22 May 2009)

Arrived today at my relatives house, and it being family obviously had to help clear the room for the work first, most of it had been done but still some things needed moving. Eventually got that done and then moved in the tools, timber and MDF! I had ordered 7 pre-cut cheets of MDF and 12 lengths of 44x44mmx2.4m and 10 lengths of 12x32mmx2.1m
Here's how things looked before I started the work:






As you can see there is a doorway on the left this is only to a small cupboard and I have removed the door as this will become a walk-in cupboard, part of the fitted wardrobes. With the ceiling height being 2.8metres long and the timber only being 2.4metres long, I had to half lap joint my four uprights. Cut straight down, and chiseled straight out. Then glued and screwed, you can see this below:






Once I lengthened all the standards I made up the two end frames first on my trestles, just using wood glue and screwing to form a butt joint, I know, I know it's not the best joint in the world but in this situation it will be fine as there is support from the walls, floor and ceiling. I filled, belt sanded and orbital sanded the two end frames. Then using a stick with a bubble in it, some might know it as a spirit level, I then got the frames aligned up against the walls, drilled and screwed, I also used wood glue and hard-as-nails to secure it. 

So now I had got my two end frames secured I then had my middle bit missing!!! Not to worry, I just measured the point of where I needed my bottom, top and middle parts and I then sanded them up, glued, screwed and job done. Heres how it looked....(if you look closely you will see how the half lap joint appears on the front)






If that picture you might be able to see the filler I've just left on, as this was the last thing I did today, I'll sand it off tomorrow. So as you can guess I have finished all of my framing on the front, well apart from fixing it to the ceiling.... I'm a bit dubious about that as I dont have a stud/electric/water detector thingy majigy! So I am thinking about not fixing it to the ceiling and just putting a noggin in from the front of the frame to the wall on the back, which I think will secure it..... your views are welcome about that!? Anyway, to finish off the first day I can happily say the whole of the front of my frame work is up and ready for the interior parts to be worked on tomorrow (well, i must move my tools out first!) , here's a picture of it:






For the more observant of you lot, you may notice the window on the left....the cracked glass? Well..... when I was half-lapping my first standard it didnt occur to me to cramp my timber to the trestles before I started whacked it with my chisel..... and..... erm..... the timber when thru the window! That's another part of the job I've got to do now!!! Not going to replace now until I've finished just incase I smack it again! Oops!

As always with my work-in-progresses, please give me your thoughts, comments and advice. Also if you have any questions I'll be happy to answer them. Thanks for looking, Simon. 22/05/09


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## wizer (22 May 2009)

Simon, have you scribed around the skirting or just screwed over the top of it??


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## joiner_sim (22 May 2009)

I haven't scribed around the skirting because the walls were bent and the skirting is in line with the top end of the wall.


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## oddsocks (22 May 2009)

Simon, good progress for day 1! I did a built in wardrobe some years ago for my daughter and used pocket screws to fit the shelves to the verticals - made it easy to move them when the layout needed to change.
Just an observation on your diagram, you have the gap between each shelf (left hand side) as 500mm and the total height as 2000 to the underside of the horizontal- implying the MDF shelves are 0mm thick. If you do need to keep the gaps identical, you should divide (2000-3*18) by 4 (assuming there is no floor level MDF) - i.e the bottom of the first shelf should be 486.5mm (no need to be THAT accurate!).

Dave


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## joiner_sim (23 May 2009)

Dave - :lol: Ha ha ha, I'm just bout to post todays WIP, but before I do I thought I'd reply to your post. My shelving unit is too short, I forgot about my 44mm timbers, so there is a 88mm gap at the top, but it's all worked out okay in the end! Once I have finished the fitted wardrobes, I will be taking notes for next time a job like this comes up so I can be more efficent in my work.


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## joiner_sim (23 May 2009)

Right well today I stopped off at Wickes first before going to the house to start up again. I brought the hanging rails and some more screws, it was fairly busy being a bank holiday weekend!
Right, well arrived and got straight to work. I started by giving the frame more strength and stability, also at the same time setting up supports for the top storage cupboards. I butt jointed the noggins with a screw thru the front of the frame, but on the back wall I half lapped my noggin over the support batten for the shelving. You can see this here:






I then trimmed the pre-cut MDF to fit. As you can see the MDF is sitting proud, and no this isn't by mistake..... well.... sort of was but it has worked out well, forming the bottom door stops already! -






After fitting all the top shelving, I got to work on making the shelving unit for the wardrobes. MDF, glued and screwed. I filled all my screw holes and sanded it all up before taking it off the trestles.






I then fitted it into the wardrobe and attached the shelf at the same time. For the more obsevrant of you, yes..... there is 4 shelves instead of the planned 3 as to my drawings. I ordered one to many I think, but it has worked out nicely with more shelves with loads of space still! I also would have liked to have ran the unit all the way up to the top but I didn't think thru my pre-cut MDF order list correctly. Oh well.......






I then got to work on putting up a divide between the wardrobe and the storage cupboard. I used another piece of pre-cut MDF I think I had over-ordered, to start myself off. I will be putting another piece in down at the bottom in when I order my last bit of MDF I require.






So that was the day pretty much over, here's a work-in-progress shot of the work for the day.






And now a bit of over-kill, but the work finished for the day after a sweep up! 






And finally a close-up shot of the interior. If you look closely youi can see that my noggin in the storage cupboard is too wide to fit in flush, so to make it smoother looking, I put a bevel on the end of the timber.






So thats all my hard work for today done! I hope if you are reading this work-in-progress, that it may be of some help to you. Although I've never really done this particular job before, I feel that so far I have done a decent job and I am quite pleased with it. However, I'm always happy to hear a second opinion, so please let me know what you think on my progress. If you have any advice or questions for me please feel free to ask! Thanks for looking as always, and please comment! Simon 23/05/09

:arrow: I'm now sat down enjoying a well deserved, ice cold pint of carlsberg! ccasion5:


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## Night Train (23 May 2009)

Nice to that it isn't white faced chipboard held to the wall with metal 'L' brackets.:lol:

Reminds me of one I was working on in Rotherham last year.

I had the same issue of the timbers being a little short of the ceiling height. I solved it by only building the frame up to the top shelf height to take the doors and then building the upper section seperately to join on to it. I set the top rail of the door frames to the picture rail height in the room and continued the picture rail across the front of the wardrobe.

For the side walls I usually space the frame away from the wall a little so that the frame is plumb and then infill the gap with a scribed piece to cover the gap down to the skirting.
I also tend to fit skirting across the front of the wardrobes to match the room and where there is a walk in door way like yours I will architrave it as a doorway to match the existing ones in the room. 

I never got the finish that one. I got as far as getting the doors on and setting everything flat and level and the client told me she'd sold up and was moving! I got paid for the job but never got to finish it.


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## MickCheese (24 May 2009)

I did a similar thing a few years ago. I never got around to finishing the rear wall and it drove my wife mad.

If I did it again I would strip the paper, line the wall and paint it white before attaching the frame.

Trying to paint that back and side wall will be a nightmare once you have installed everything.

What do you intend to do with it?

Looking good by the way.

Mick


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## joiner_sim (24 May 2009)

Mick, it's in a relatives house, so that really shouldn't be my problem... However, it will be because I'm decorating the whole room once the wardrobes are finished. And new carpet is being laid down after. Wallpapering only one wall, so painting up all the rest over the existing paper. We are thinking painting the wallpaper the same colour as the wardrobes so it all matches up and dont have to worry about the different colours.


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## joiner_sim (24 May 2009)

Today, was the last day I'm working on the job now until next weekend, so time was of the essence to get as much done as possible, as I already knew I would need to order some more MDF for doors and panelling. These pictures have been not been taken as the work was done.....
First thing I did this morning was sand up the filler that I left on the frame last night, I also then took all the sharp edges off the framing inside and out. I then cut the clothes rails and sorted out the end fixtures for them. On the middle wardrobe I had to add supports for the rail because of the long span. And as the supports are only sold at 60mm long, I had to lower them using timber, something I didn't really want to do, but it had to be done to make the wardrobe useable. So in an attempt to make an error look "stylish" I sanded up the timbers and rounded off all the edges and fixed them on a 45degree angle, as you can see....






As you can already see in the picture above, I fitted the four doors I do have. I'm missing one of the wardrobes doors and all of the top cupboard doors, which will be ordered and delivered within the week for me. I trimmed the tops and bottoms of the doors, with a jigsaw if it was required for a better fit.

The hinges I am using are 2" flush cranked hinges from wickes. They have got alot more strength than I actually thought they had. I am putting 4 hinges on per door. They are pretty good to use and makes hanging the doors easier work. I am also aware that I may be using the hinges the wrong way around but it works for me and the design.






One problem I have now encountered using the hinges the wrong way around to suit my design, is that the knuckle of the hinge pushes the door out of the frame and does not bring it flush with the frame, as you can see in the picture below. To fix this problem I am going to just chisel out some space for the knuckle to sit inside the framing.






I then took off all the doors after fitting, then sanded them all up. I then marked out the doors for the mock panels I'm putting on them, you can see the faint lines on the door in the picture below. For the mock panels, I'm going to get some thin MDF 3 or 6mm....? and just glue and pin them to the doors. I was going to bead them all, but after looking at moulded timber prices I think it would have worked out uneconomical.






I have now also covered the gaps between the framing and the walls, scribing a piece of 32x12mm all the way around, sorry no pictures taken of that yet.

And finally a picture I took before I removed the doors... ( this picture was taken as it is more or less the design I drew to begin with)






Well, thats it for this weekend, going to enjoy the bank holiday now, well whats left of it anyways! And you know what coming next, as always please feel free to comment on the work and ask questions! Thanks for looking, Simon - 24/05/09


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## jhwbigley (24 May 2009)

what about normal flush hinges? a piece of pie to fit and will have your doors sitting flush to the frame.

John


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## joiner_sim (24 May 2009)

I dont like the idea of the normal flush hinge holding a 2000x650 18mm thick MDF door. I'm not too keen on the idea of these cranked hinges holding them, but its the best option I thought I had. A cranked hinge has more grip on the door in my opinion, but my question to you would be..... 

:arrow: Have you put a flush hinge on a 18mm MDF door at approx. 2000x650, does it take the weight?


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## JanneKi (25 May 2009)

Normal euro-style hinges can easily take the larger doors, just use more hinges! They usually have 3-4 to hold the larger doors.


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## joiner_sim (31 May 2009)

The wardrobes are completed, I forgot to take my digital camera with me on the final day, and so took a picture on my mobile, but now I can't get the pics transferred! :roll: 

I'm going back to it on saturday to replace the glass in the windows and fix a few loose floorboards, so hopefully will get some pictures taken then, althought they may have been primed up by then.....

The work that was done to complete.....

Last 6 doors were fitted and sanded. The all the 10 doors were panelled with 6mm MDF, glued and nialed on. The hinges were chopped in to allow the doors to sit flush, due to the knuckle on the hinges didnt let them sit flush. Magnectic catches and handles were fitted to all the doors.

Pictures to come on saturday, and then I'll post up final pictures once the room's been decorated and carpeted.
Simon.


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## joiner_sim (4 Jun 2009)

Right, well I forgot to take my camera with me on the last two days of working on the wardrobes, but here are the pictures taken today of it all finished, without the paint on just yet. I will be posting up pictures of the wardrobes again once the room's decorated, carpeted and looking neat again, so you can see how it all fits in.

The first picture shows how I have scribed my frame around the skirting and shapes of the walls, using a bit of 12x32mm timber. You can also see that the doors also sit flush now after I chopped the knuckle of the hinge into the frame.






The next picture shows interior parts finished, and you can also see the undercoat has has been started to get applied. You also get a peek at the completed finished doors.






The next picture shows the middle part of the wardrobe, where there is long hanging space and eventually underneath a shoe rack will be placed inside. You will also notice the partion bewteen the wardrobe and cupboard has been completed!






And now a close-up of all the handles and panels. The panel are 6mm thick and have been pinned and glued onto the 18mm thick doors.






The wardrobes are so tall I could not fit the whole lot in from top to bottom, so the last two pictures show you the finished wardrobes from the outside.











Well thats it, in total it took 5 days to complete to this stage, and I am quite happy with it myself and so is the relative whose house they are in! Just got to get that decorating done now and then I'll post up a finished picture when the room's complete. Please let me know what you think of this, and I hope this has helped you if there is something in this work-in-progress that was relevant to you.

Thanks, Simon. 04/06/09


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## rileytoolworks (5 Jun 2009)

Very good work Sim, considering it was all built on site. If I had one comment though (and this is personal preference), I'd have preferred to have the applied panel edges bevelled slightly.
Keep up the good work.


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## oddsocks (5 Jun 2009)

nice job- bet it really comes to life with the colour applied as well.

I have lost count of the number of times i've cut something too short by the thickness of the timber, so although I never learned anything new from the project it's certainly helped to remind me to double check any diagram for that exact problem (pity I made my garden table in April and made virtually this same mistake by misreading a diagram!). 

I think your project will inspire others that such large builds are achievable with planning and a methodical approach.

Nice one  

Dave


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## joiner_sim (6 Jun 2009)

Thanks to everyone who's looked! Please feel free to comment.
Have been down there today undercoating the wardrobes and painting the ceiling of the room.

Riley- As you said, it is personal preference, however I did consider routing the edges of the panels, but decided to leave them to create the straight edges and have a clear line between panels, rails and stiles. With a routered edge I don't think I'd of achieved that.

Dave- As I said just above, been putting the undercoat on today. Undercoat doesn't really do the wardrobes justice just yet, thats the gloss's job! With regards to the finish on the MDF, I haven't experienced the furry edge problems others have described in the past, the edges seem to have taken the paint extremely well. The edges were sanded up with an orbital snader with a fine grit. - Sorry, I know you didn't ask but thought I'd mention that...
As you mentioned about getting things cut too short, this project has taught me to work it out better in future. It has also given me an idea of how much I should charge for labour on a job like this one if it was going to be paid for.
I hope my work does inspire others to realise they can do a project this big. I should point out although I do get paid to be a bench joiner, this wardrobe build was unknown territory for me with regards to as how it should be done and so it was a bit off the cuff and only had my experience behind me to help me.

Please keep comments, and questions coming, thanks, Simon.


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## BradNaylor (7 Jun 2009)

Simon,

Not a bad first effort at fitted wardrobes - probably a lot better than mine!

My comments centre on the doors.

The 'panels' applied to the surfaces of the doors look a little odd to me. Better IMO would have been to apply 6mm thick strips around the edges and across the middle of each door in imitation of rails and stiles leaving sunken 'panels'. 

In future I woud always go for concealed 'kitchen door' hinges. 4 or 5 on a door of this size is plenty strong enough and the beauty is that they are adjustable. You have chosen to fit your doors inside your wooden frame. Unless there are pressing design reasons for this I would always mount wardrobe doors on the surface of the frame for ease of ftting and adjustment. 

Lay-on doors = very easy and quick
Inset doors = time consuming and a PITA!

People will pay extra for a kitchen with doors inset within a frame and hung on brass butts, but in a bedroom 99.9% of people are perfectly happy with lay-on doors. Keep the gaps between them small and use filler strips or end panels at each end of a run of doors and no-one will know the difference anyway!

For instance these are lay-on doors hung on standard concealed hinges, but look inset.







Doing them like this can save a day in terms of making and fitting time for a big wardrobe.

Cheers
Brad


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## wizer (7 Jun 2009)

Well Done Sim, better than I could have done. I do agree with Brad that lay on doors would have been better. Do show us once the room's finished.


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## rileytoolworks (7 Jun 2009)

Sim, just read your other post stating that materials came to £500-£750.
Do you have a breakdown of this? I think you're paying too much!


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## Dave S (7 Jun 2009)

BradNaylor":1b81a4zj said:


> Unless there are pressing design reasons for this I would always mount wardrobe doors on the surface of the frame for ease of ftting and adjustment.
> 
> Lay-on doors = very easy and quick
> Inset doors = time consuming and a PITA!
> ...


Damn - that's one 'trade tip' I didn't pick up on when I did mine - wish I had, though!
Already had one aborted attempt to hang inset doors on a set of wardrobes I made some time ago... wonder if I could alter the design to do it this way. Where's the tape measure??

Dave


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## Mailman14 (7 Jun 2009)

These are the pain in my neck!

Yours, however are a job well done, and on your own too!

I (admittedly - I'm a newbie), put a whole carcase in the gaps in my bedroom, one each side of the chimney breast - don't ask me why! When I saw the piccy of the noggins to hold the shelf supports I could have kicked myself...  How to save time, effort, & money...

Anyway, being a 'rustic' joiner (i.e. I'm not brilliant), I did do half lap joints, on cross-overs, pocket hole screw joints, trued up vertical and horizontal etc, etc. BTW Have you _ever_ tried lifting a square frame into position on your own - don't try it - it's a pain! Also - don't ask a shorter person to help - twisting the frame can cause a headache.

I didn't have the "ceiling too high" problem, rather, "wood's too long". - oh, and the bedroom was being lived in at the time - try explaining sawdust in the bed to your wife :roll: .

I laid my doors on the outside, with the disadvantage of having a radiator up-pipe in the wayof a fully openeing door - 3 hinges on there, so 3 on each of the others. MDF is too thin, so slightly warped doors (being kept stacked in the garage didn't help), I DID, however, manage to put shelving in each wardrobe, chipboard shelves & uprights, a noggin in both sides and the back (I know!), AND I didn't fall into the "allow for shelf thickness" problem - previous trial and error taught me that.

NO pictures of it - I'd be ashamed to show my paultry efforts on this thread, after the wonderful pics above, just, you _did_ ask for comments ( :wink: ?)

My wife has been banned from visiting this website on pain of me being divorced for lack of speed / quality / enthusiasm / etc... :lol:


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## joiner_sim (7 Jun 2009)

Thanks for all the comments  

I think I may go for trying kitchen type hinges next time.
I think the materials came to more like about £500. There's quite a few sheets of 18mm MDF and 6mm MDF and 12 lengths of 44x44x2.4m and 10 lengths of 12x32x2m we also had to pay for 3 deliveries for this lot.
And, I did make the frame on trestles but had help to lift it up.


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## DeanN (8 Jun 2009)

That still sounds expensive for materials. I'd have thought around £300-£350 for the timber, fixings and other hardware - maybe £400 max if you're buying hardware from the sheds. The cutting service and delivery charges must account for a fair proportion of the bill! 

Don't forget to add your labour costs onto the final amount, and let your relatives know the amount it would have cost them if you'd have been charging the full amount. Then ask them to get their friends around to show off the new wardrobes, and offer them a referral fee (half or full days days labour on future projects) for any orders that result from the viewings.

Looking forward to seeing the finished product.


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## joiner_sim (8 Jun 2009)

As you said also the hardware, thats included in the rough estimate in cost. Thats.... 30 cranked concealed hinges, 10 handles, 20pk magnetic catches, all the different sizes of screws..... I used 5.0x100mm 5.0x70mm 3.0x25mm 3.0x20mm 15mm veneer pins. It all adds up.... and also... two single panes of glass, one for a window i put thru and another for one that was previously cracked before. Delivery charges were about £20 a go, which would be £60.


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## Streepips (12 Jun 2009)

Hi Simon, been following your WIP with the robes, and I am sure your relatives/customers will be pleased !

I noticed this thread about the same day I started a very similar job, alcove, fitted robes, MDF , etc etc but I went about it in quite a different way.
Nothing wrong with either way but I am quite happy with mine now, which requires a minimum of framework and yet is still strong/ Another approach to hinges, another way of embellishing the door with panelling effect, in fact much the same job but done a different way.
If I can remember how to post pics I will if you don't regard it as hijacking your thread !

PS 
I have done a fair few built-ins more or less as you have done there and I find the way I have come round to doing them much easier..just a bit more shop time beforehand. Each to their own, but we all learn along the way.


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## joiner_sim (24 Jun 2009)

Well as promised, here's the final set of pictures with the finish on them. Well, when I say final, I might post a final, final picture once the room has been carpeted and moved into..... But I'll see. The fitted wardrobes have had two coats of undercoat and a final coat of satin finish "Champagne" colour, it took a hell of alot of paint to do the three coats!

The first two pictures show you the wardrobes from the outside, with the second one giving you a better view of the top.











This next picture shows you the full height of the wardrobes, and next to it the first wall I've ever wall-papered, which I realised has a skill to it. The other two walls of the room, were just painted.






This next one is a close-up of the handles, and panels, I know these photos have been done before, but they look different now the finish has been applied!






The middle compartment, with full length hanging space. A small shop-brought shoe rack is to be assembled and just placed at the bottom.






The end walk-in cupboard. As you can see, I left the original doorway in, and the shelves have been left in from the previous cupboard. The ceiling of the cupboard has been fitted above in such a way that the screws can easily be located and the MDF removed if you were to want to use the space above the cupboard in the future.






And, finally, the other end compartment, with shelving and hanging space combined.






Just to end, here's what it looked like before I did the work.






I hope you've enjoyed reading through this long work-in-progress. I'm glad its all been finished now..... onto the next project!

Thanks for reading, Simon


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## Jezmaster (24 Jun 2009)

great work


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## woodchip (25 Jun 2009)

nice work Simon.

I always like finishing a project because it means I can start the next, which is the best bit of all!


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## joiner_sim (26 Jun 2009)

Thanks, went over there today to help move furniture back in after the carpet has been fitted, and all i can say is WOW, without being too big headed, with the carpet laid, the wardrobes look really good and the wallpapering on the accent wall really sets it all off. I'm hoping it brings me work in the future, but I think I'll give the decorating part a miss> too long winded!


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