DIY Idea: A Creative Family Coat Rack

Families know it best - without some kind of system, your foyer can quickly become a mess: mountains of jackets and shoes all mixed up with toys and other odds and ends. But what can you do to motivate the kids to hang their things on a hook instead of just using the floor as a closet?

Having enough hooks on your coat rack would be a good start. It’s even better when it’s clear which hook belongs to whom. An idea here is to label the hooks with names or, especially recommendable for little children, decorate the hooks with photos. However, simple digital photo prints come with a disadvantage: daily wear and tear will cause them to crinkle and fold quite fast. A coat rack made of photo mouse pads, on the other hand, will be sure to immediately catch the attention of your guests.

Here we’ll show you a DIY project idea for making a coat rack using ifolor photo mouse pads. Our mouse pads are robust and big enough to ensure that every family member has enough space for their personal belongings.

All you’ll need to easily build your own individual coat rack is a simple wooden board, a trim strip, a bit of varnish, as well as a few coat hooks and some furniture knobs. In addition, you’ll also need an electric drill equipped with a wood drill bit, screws, a screwdriver, sandpaper, and a brush:

1. Start out by searching for a good picture of each family member and print them out in landscape format on a photo mouse pad. Both selfies and portrait photos work great here. ifolor offers multiple layouts for you to use. For children, you could use a layout with footballs, horses, or perhaps colourful borders. For adults, feel free to go with a no-frills full-format photo.

2. The width of the wooden board you use for your coat rack depends on how much available space you have as well as how many members are in your family and how many coats they need to hang up. Every mouse pad is 23 cm wide and you should also plan some extra room between each mouse pad. An ideal width for this coat rack idea is between 85 and 145 cm. The board should be about 30-40 cm high.

3. If necessary, sand down the board with sand paper to smooth out the surface.

4. Use wood glue to affix the trim strip on the upper end of the coat rack; this is certainly not a must, but it does add a nice touch.

5. Paint/lacquer your coat rack with a colour of your choice (preferably with a solvent-free lacquer) and let it dry well.

6. Mark out the space between the hooks in equidistant intervals. An example for a family of three could be 5 marks: 3 coat hooks and 2 furniture knobs for bags and other accessories. Make sure to keep in mind to leave enough space above the hooks for the mouse pads.

7. Affix the coat hooks to the board with small screws. For this, you could use hooks made with porcelain balls or maybe simple metal.

8. You’ll have to drill holes to affix the furniture knobs. For drilling into the wooden board, a standard power drill and wood drill bit will get the job done. Then you’ll have the knobs in place.

9. Affix your mouse pads above the coat hooks with double-sided tape.

10. Finished!