Writing this post has been a LONG time coming. To be completely honest, I don’t know why it took me so long because I have been so excited to share this IKEA hack with Billy bookcases with y’all!

The moment we bought our house, we knew that we wanted some custom shelving or built-in’s in our living room, but custom ones are generally thousands of dollars. We also looked into some large entertainment centers like this one from Pottery Barn or this one from Crate & Barrel, but again… $2000 or more. Which is still probably cheaper than having something custom built and installed, but I knew there had to be a cheaper option. I started researching Pinterest and found that people were IKEA hacking entertainment centers. I’m no stranger to IKEA hacks (see IKEA RAST hack), but this was definitely a larger scale project than what I had tried before. I couldn’t find a blog that had EXACTLY what Garrett and I had in mind, or gave full instructions for what we wanted, so I decided to make a post with our experience! I also tried to include LOTs of pictures of the process so that it hopefully makes sense!

UPDATE! Here is our 2 year update on this project:

DIY Built-Ins with IKEA Bookshelves: A 2 Year Update

Here’s some before pictures of our living room prior to this project:

When we first moved in:

When upgraded our furniture slightly:

That wall for our TV was so empty and sad! We were using the console and TV from our apartment which was a much smaller living room space and was definitely appropriate at the time. But I felt like the TV was being eaten alive by the large wall in our new house, and it was necessary not only to have shelves to fill the space, but also get a larger TV.

If you’re thinking about doing this and also thinking about upgrading your TV and/or adding a sound bar, I would highly recommend doing that at the same time as this project. We upgraded our 55 inch TV to a 65 inch TV and got a compatible soundbar prior to starting this project so that we could ensure that:

a. the TV would fit nicely in this set-up we were building (we originally were not going to have the narrow, middle bookshelf with baskets, but had to add it in when we realized that our new TV would not fit without it)

b. the cords could be organized and set-up all at once

First off, we purchased all of our bookcases from IKEA. We had it ordered and shipped to us because we didn’t have a car large enough to get it from our local IKEA. Shipping is like $50 for your whole order, so get everything at once! Garrett and I spent an evening assembling all of the bookcases. The first one took us a bit longer to figure out, but once we got that one done, we got on a roll and were able to knock the rest out. The next day, my dad came over and helped me with mounting it onto the wall and screwing everything together.

The first hurdle we had to overcome was our floor trim.

The back of the bookcases had a notch already made on the bottom to allow the bookshelf to push up flat against the wall, but it wasn’t quite big enough for our trim. We REALLY didn’t want to remove or cut into our trim for this project. My dad brought over his jig saw (you can buy one if you need it for under $20 on Amazon), we measured out how much extra we needed to cut out of the bottom , and went for it. To be honest, it was not the cleanest, most perfect cut, but it is not noticeable at all! We always keep a basket of blankets in that corner, so unless you moved that, no one can tell!

Hopefully this photo explains what I’m trying to say (LOL):

Once we had made all of the necessary cuts on all of the bookshelves, we arranged them and centered them how we wanted them.

Here’s a part that is something important to consider. We had a power outlet and cable outlet on the wall that we needed to plug our router and TV into, however, it was going to end up behind one of the short bookshelves. We marked where those outlets were and used the jig saw to make cuts into the back of the appropriate bookshelf so that we could maintain access to them. It’s behind doors on the bookshelf, so no one can tell how messy it looks!

We also had to make a small cut in the top of one of the short bookshelves so that we could connect our TV to the power outlet and other things. We could have instead made a hole in the wall and dropped it through, but I had never done that before and it kind of scared me haha! Instead we just bought this cord cover and plan on eventually painting it the same color as our wall!

Once all of the cuts were made, we started securing the bookshelves together. We connected all of the bookshelves together with screws and nuts so that there was no space in between them. I did this by drilling holes through the already existing holes that exist for the shelves. I then installed a screw through the hole and secured it with a nut. It doesn’t look perfect, but again, it’s behind a door! Next is securing everything into the wall. We used a stud finder (a necessity for this project, so that you can ensure it is safely secured to your wall and not going to tip over! Here’s a great one on Amazon) to figure out where we needed to screw it in, and then used wood screws (that I already had) and put them into the bottom section that is hidden by the door and the top.  I recommend securing the bookshelves together prior to mounting them onto the wall. The reason for this is when we connect the bookshelves with screws, it will move one bookshelf slightly so that there is no gap in between them, and this may not happen if you secure it into the wall first. (HOPEFULLY THAT MAKES SENSE!)

You could stop here if you wanted! We did for a while until we found the trim that was perfect. We mounted our TV and added knobs to the doors.

But once we found the perfect trim, my dad measured and cut it (my dad handled that because I had no idea how!), we secured it to the top of the tall bookshelves with wood glue and nails. We then spackled the holes, painted the trim a clean white, and we were DONE!

We have decorated our shelves with these baskets in the middle bookshelf, hardcover books, photos, a plant, and various knick-knacks from HomeGoods 🙂

All the supplies:

Tall Billy bookcases: $59 each (I used 2)

Extension unit for tall bookcases: $25 each (I used 2)

Short Billy bookcases: $39 each (I used 2)

Short, narrow Billy bookcase: $29 each (I used 1)

Oxberg doors: $30 each (I used 8)

Liberty Classic Bell Matte Black Cabinet Knob (4-Pack): under $17 (I bought 2 packs)

Cord cover: under $15

Molding/Trim from Home Depot: ~$10

Total: under $600

 

Other things:

Threshold Small Seagrass Milk Crate 8″x10″: under $13 (I bought 3)

Samsung 65-Inch Smart TV: under $600

Samsung HW-R450 soundbar and subwoofer: under $150

TV mount: under $50

 

Hopefully if you are looking for a solution to a big empty wall in your house, this tutorial helps you out! If you have ANY questions at all, please email me, comment, DM me, and I will be happy to explain myself better on how we did this project! 🙂

 

And here’s the official BEFORE AND AFTER!