IKEA Hack: IVAR Home Office Shelves

Hello! And welcome to Landeelu.com! I’m so glad you’re here. Today I’m sharing a bit more about my home office that I am putting together. This space used to be our almost completely unused dining room. I claimed it as my own and have slowly but surely been putting it all together! I needed to have a LOT of storage in this area as it would also double as a craft room so I wanted some wall-to-wall shelving. Well, wouldn’t you know, an IKEA hack was the perfect solution!

I guess I could have had someone come in and build some custom built ins, but that would have been thousands of dollars! I also could have bought some pre-fab book shelves and made something work but I didn’t want anything to be too visually heavy or hard to change out later (sometimes I’m a bit fickle). So when I came across these IKEA IVAR shelves I knew I could make them into exactly what I needed. All they needed was a little paint and some pretty styling!

I believe these IVAR shelves are meant to be quite utilitarian. No fuss. All function. But, unlike a lot of IKEA products, they are solid pine. That very much appealed to me. That meant I could paint them, drill into them (if needed) and basically do whatever I wanted to do with them. They also come in a lot of different sizes which meant that I could configure them as needed for my space as well.

Luckily, 4 sets of shelves across fit perfectly! So I got 16 shelves (they are almost 20″ deep—yes!), 5 uprights (I got the 49″ tall ones but they have taller!) and 4 sets of the criss-cross support bars for the back. Grand total for over 11 linear feet of shelving? $220. Two. Hundred. And. Twenty. Two. Dollars. Amazing!

I got some Benjamin Moore Simply White paint for the shelves and I made pretty quick work of painting it by using my awesome HomeRight paint sprayer.

Such an awesome, every day, paint sprayer! And super affordable too. You can get one for yourself here (affiliate link): HomeRight Paint Sprayer

And then I used Rustoleum Metallic Gold (affiliate link) spray paint on the uprights and the support bars that criss-cross in the back.

I just love how it all came together! Light and airy but definitely functional for all of the storage that I need for my new home office. I had a great time searching for pretty storage bins and styling my shelves! And I’m guessing I will always be tinkering and rearranging them as my needs change.

IKEA HACK: Home Office Shelving

I now need to decide what kind of decor I want to hang above the shelves. A grid of picture frames? A fun, whimsical gallery wall? Three large pieces of art? I can’t decide! If you have an opinion let me know!

Here are some other projects I have completed in my home office already. I love working in this space now!