Hook me up!

For over a year I've had a coat rack serving as an all-purpose clothing catch-all, which made sense because it was free and it served the purpose of holding clothes that weren't quite dirty, purses that were probably going to be used again soon, and a big floppy hat with nowhere else to go.  However, at some point I started to realize that having a circular standing item in a corner meant that it was all too easy to loose track of items buried towards the middle, and it just looked a bit......looming.  It made the corner feel cluttered, with all the bulk of the clothes jumbled together.  I'll spare you a picture of the hodgepodge, and instead provide a visual of the item itself.

Coat rack, on the way out the door.

Very functional, and easy to disassemble, but I've posted the coat rack for free, hopefully someone takes it.  I don't need it because I've replaced floating hooks with wall hooks - or rather, drawer pulls attached to the wall to serve as hooks.  Looking online and browsing randomly in stores it seemed like all the hooks were either huge with very visible attachment screws, multiple hooks mounted on some larger wood piece that was probably too large for the given wall space, or pretty but possibly too delicate, and they were all more than I wanted to pay.  I might have seen this online, who knows where the idea came from, but I started to wonder about drawer pulls and if they could be used as wall hooks - probably inspired by those achingly pretty drawer pulls at Anthro*******.  I found two tutorials online that confirmed yes! this can be done and yes! it is quite easy. One tutorial is from this site, so if you don't believe me, believe the professionals at another blog.

I had a set of white ceramic drawer knobs that were scavenged from a dresser somewhere in the distant past, they had even been used as knobs on the green dresser at one point - before being swapped out for gold beetles.  These knobs, sitting in my own bin of salvaged hardware all along, were just what I wanted - sleek, smooth, and free.  I brought my knobs to the hardware store, where luckily I could buy exactly the number of hanger bolts required and test them to make sure they fit the knobs - I appreciate only having to buy the amount needed for a project rather than a bundled set. I did get extra drywall anchors, because those have been known to break during installation.

ceramic drawer pulls, hanger bolts, drywall anchors

The hanger bolts have two different halves, a flat end with narrower threads that fits into the knob, and the other end with wood-screw-width threads that goes into the drywall anchor.  It is easy to tell which end is which, I recommend attaching the hanger bolt to the knob first, then screwing the whole thing into the installed drywall anchor.

Hanger bolt, inserted into ceramic drawer knob

Pre-drilling the holes, hammering in the drywall anchors, and screwing in the knobs took less than 10 minutes. So easy!  I started with a small drill bit to pre-drill a hole and then moved my way up until the bit size was still a bit smaller than the drywall anchor, but the was because these were hammer-in rather than screw-in drywall anchors.

Drawer knob, now wall hook

The result, a lovely set of sleek and functional hooks that blend in to the wall, but are ready and waiting to hold the clothing parade of the modern city dweller.

Multiple new wall storage options

Happy freestyling, and don't worry about taking hardware, you never know what new purpose it might serve!