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How to build a walk-in closet easily: IKEA hack

build a walk-in closet easily

For many homeowners it’s a big wish to have a walk-in closet or separated office, study or hobby room. Our guide shows how to build a walk-in closet easily with an IKEA hack.

The walk-in closet is the classic among the living rooms and is far too seldom put into practice. Why, in fact? The construction is very simple: all you need are bookshelves, which are extended or clad up to the corresponding ceiling height with furniture construction panels, a sliding door system and a few wooden panels as filling for the sliding door. They are available in every hardware store. Even the inner part is, so to speak, “off the shelf”. All you have to do is screw it all up to build a walk-in closet easily.

In our case (see sketch) a total of six “Billy” shelves and three wardrobes from The well-known “Pax” series from Ikea were used. The sliding door is from an online shop. 

Build a walk-in closet easily: The right planning

Whether it’s a walk-in closet, mini office or hobby room: If you want to completely or even partially separate part of a room with a sliding door system, you have to be very precise when measuring to build a walk-in closet easily.

Here’s how it works: Determine the heights left and right on the wall as well as in the center of the room, because the ceiling could hang through or bulge. But to measure a room height in the middle, you need either an electronic measuring device or a 3m tape measure.

In addition, there are the widths on the ceiling, floor and, for example, at the middle of the room. Also use the spirit level to check that the walls are straight. If not, you should note the deviations in centimeters.

The interior: Now that the available space is known, the interior can be defined, preferably on millimeter graph paper on which the planned space is drawn. In our walk-in closet, the cabinets from the Ikea “Pax” series and “Billy” shelves were used. To this end, it is helpful to obtain the brochure “Cabinet Systems” from Ikea. It contains all cabinet sizes as well as complete accessories such as drawers, wire baskets, trouser suspensions and shoe storage. Based on the number of cabinets and shelves or the status of the partitions, the number of doors can be determined.

Sliding doors: Everything that revolves around the sliding doors can be done online. To do this, you should have all the dimensions you have determined, as the manufacturer needs these to determine the ceiling and floor rails. You have to decide what shape the door profilenwill be, i.e. what shape the handle bar should have, and of course also how wide the door or the passageway must be.

Spatially separated

Simple shelves form the walls of our walk-in closet. Access is through a sliding door, which is guided through a floor and a ceiling rail. First we cover the chipboard with appealing wallpaper.

The three fillings for the aluminium profile doors consist of 8 mm raw board, which are available in the DIY store. The exact dimensions for the fillings can be obtained directly from the sliding door manufacturer. In our case, we opted for a variant divided with two aluminium struts. The reasons for this are purely taste reasons, and of course you can also choose a completely continuous filling. So this has nothing to do with statics or stability.

1. Sliding door

Covering the door with wallpaper. First coat the wallpaper with a layer of glue. Leave to cure.

While the paste on the wallpaper “cures”, the complete chipboard is coated once with a layer of paste.

The wallpaper is glued onto the chipboard in one piece (to be cut into three pieces later on).

To make it easier to cut and separate the wallpaper later, a match is placed between the plates as a divider.

Now the wallpaper is cut.

Finally, the back of each piece is wallpapered.

2. Profiles, rollers and mounting

Once both wallpaper sides are completely dried, the aluminium profiles on the lower filling are pushed on. If it should be a bit difficult, a rubber hammer helps to apply gentle taps to the profile without injuring the wallpaper. The side profiles are placed in such a way that they clear a distance of 5 cm measured from below.

The lower cross profile is mounted with the supplied hex screws. The top of the two screw holes picks up the screw, which rotates self-cutting into the profile.

The narrow intermediate bars are pushed onto the filling and into the side profile without mounting screws.

Now push on the upper profile, turn the mounting screw slightly into it and insert the guide into the side profile.

build a walk-in closet easily

Now the mounting screw is tightened tightly.

build a walk-in closet easily

If the sliding door runs against a wall or a shelf, then the supplied rubber profile should be glued to the side of the profile as a damper.

build a walk-in closet easily

The roller with the clamping spring is inserted.

build a walk-in closet easily

Fix the roller in the lower hole using the hex screw.

build a walk-in closet easily

Tighten the screw so that the roller disappears almost completely into the profile.

build a walk-in closet easily

The ceiling rail – depending on the type of use with a single running rail or with two – is fastened by means of dowels and screws.

build a walk-in closet easily

The sliding door is first inserted into the upper rail.

build a walk-in closet easily

The door is then placed on the floor rail, which must not be attached to the ground at this stage, as it must remain movable to align.

build a walk-in closet easily

The spirit level is now used to align the door and the floor rail. If everything is right and straight, the seat of the floor rail is marked with a piece of painting or tape. Then remove the door and remove the protective strip from the adhesive back, which is located under the floor rail. Now place the self-adhesive floor rail in the marked position and re-hang the door.

build a walk-in closet easily

The door itself can now be adjusted by the rollers in height.

build a walk-in closet easily

You can connect the cupboard and the ceiling with a self-made angle made of mfd or similar furniture paneling.

Find more great home decor ideas in our Home category.

gerhardt-richter Gerhardt Richter is a writer and a trainer at trade technical colleges, specializing in carpentry, plumbing, mechanics and construction.