Repurposing Items for Great Design

So you have these old chairs and you do not want to get rid of them but you are running out of space in your home to keep them. Many of these types of items, old and no longer used, may be stored in an area of your home that you do not know what to do with and you are second guessing whether to keep them at all. There may be a sentimental feeling when you look at these pieces or you may realize that good money was spent to procure these items making it financially irresponsible for you to part with them. So what is a homeowner to do? Once suggestion is to repurpose these items and others you may find on your travels.



Keeping these items will help reduce your household expenses by reusing the items in new ways and also create a new style to your home that will set you apart from the others. Repurposing pieces gives you creative liberty to create the most unique style that only you can portray.

Create a Vintage Style

Taking a step back in time with old pieces of furniture can give your home a vintage or antique style. Using furniture and accessories that reflect a past gone by can create an elegant home. This design style gives you the opportunity to search for hidden gems that may have belonged to another with stories from another lifetime that you can use when telling the tales of your own home.

Creative Storage Options

Some pieces of furniture can make new forms of storage for your home. Using a bureau or dresser to store books or personal treasures or removing the drawers from the dresser to create a new storage area that acts more like an open bookshelf can be a great addition to a home. An old door can be added to a coffee table to create a table top that lifts and stores games or magazines when guests come to visit. After some paint and a removal of the drawers, use an old metal file cabinet to store garden supplies. Use the cabinet and dresser drawers to create wall shelfs to hold other items around your home.



Making it New Again

Managing to take an older piece of furniture and refreshing it is a project that you can do on your own. For instance, removing the varnish on tables or chairs, sanding them down and then refinishing them with a stain or paint that suits your new home design can be wonderful new old additions to your home. Reupholstering a chair or sofa with a new fabric that is more current can also bring new energy to a room and can completely change the room’s design. Even using old dressers as bathroom vanities to store a sink and bathroom toiletries is a great way to create new design while keeping the old.

Thinking Out of the Box

Getting original can easily be accomplished with old pieces of furniture that you might be thinking of discarding. Looking at the piece and determining how it can be used uniquely might require destroying it a bit. For instance, creating a bench out of a table that has been sawed in half or removing the innards and the face of a piano or guitar to create a shelf that showcases your love of music. Using cook’s tools to create pendant lights in your kitchen can be a whimsy design you add to your home. These pieces are affordable and can be found most anywhere to create a fabulous conversation piece. Even old keys and gardening tools can act as hooks to hold everything from kitchen utensils and coats to wine glasses and jewelry.



So before you decide to throw out those old pieces in storage, take a look at how you might be able to incorporate them in your home’s design with a new view of what purpose them might provide.


Elizabeth Dodson is the co-founder of HomeZada , a cloud-based home improvement and organizational software tool. HomeZada strives to educate and provide resources for homeowners in all areas of home management, including home improvement projects, maintenance, inventory, property information, and property value.

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