Ikea hacking is cool, you know. Conceptually. It's thinking outside the flat box (not my pun, unfortunately). It's DIY design for the people. I am always on wait for new Ikea hacker posts.

And then there was that DIY workshop I attended, Rosh Bakir. I should really be posting about it separately. So for the time, let's just say it's totally motivational, and puts you in constant search of home improvement projects.

So in short, when my sister wanted to hack her Antonius high unit (made of two frames and 10 baskets) for baby stuff storage, I was hooked. What we basically needed was a frame, to protect the inside from dust.

For the frame we used something called multi-wall polypropylene sheets. If you are in Israel, you know it under the generic term Polygal, and you can buy it in office supplies stores. Having searched the web extensively for an English term, I tend to think it's not much of a consumer product elsewhere, which is a pity, because it's so easy to use, versatile, colorful and inexpensive.

Now you should go to Flickr to see the project photos. If you are interested in more details, come back here and read the rest.

Still here? Basically what we did first was to sand & paint 4 pine sticks (which we bought to measure, 1.73m). We cut the Polygal sheets to size. Since they come at 0.8x1.2m, we needed two pieces for each side. These pieces should overlap a little, otherwise it would be difficult to avoid a narrow gap between the pieces. We drilled 6 holes on each side of the Antonius, and then used screws to attach the pine to the metal with the Polygal in between. You need the screw heads to have flat backs (because it's metal on the head side) and pointy edges (because you screw them into wood).

We also put Polygal pieces at the bottom of the drawers so that small items won't fall. And - here's a small child safety trick we learnt from the local Ikea store (נתניה שולתתת!!1) - we used cable ties to attach the drawers to the metal frame and prevent pulling the drawer completely out.

And then there is a Lisel curtain in the front. Sorry guys, sis seems to have bought the last item around, it's no longer in the web catalogue. It was 45cm wide, so it fit nicely, but I guess other curtains will do. The curtain is hanged using the Index panel hanger. The hanger sits on two circle-headed screws (probably not the correct term, but I am trying of looking them up) attached to the front pine sticks.

When the baby starts crawling around, we will attach the entire unit to the wall. But that's correct with all your high furniture, you know.

And then: Yay! We did it!