Our last house had a built-in entertainment center, which was great! We loved the fact that we never had to buy a unit to hold our electronic equipment. However, it wasn’t such a great thing when we moved! We had a 52 inch TV that sat on our coffee table for months until we came up with an inexpensive solution for holding our TV.
We wanted more than just a console to hold our TV. We wanted something that was aesthetically pleasing and that would hide a lot of our kids’ toys and games. One night, I found inspiration as I was looking through Craigslist ads, and came up with a solution that would meet all of our requirements.
First, we found these hideous bookcases on Craigslist for $60 for three!
Okay, so they’re not THAT hideous…and please don’t be mad at me if you have these same bookcases in your house! The plan was to use two of these on each end of the TV compartment.
To hold the TV, we ended up purchasing an unfinished 60 inch bathroom sink base at a home improvement store. Here it is while my husband was modifying it:
My husband added finished plywood on top of the vanity, to the sides, and then added a top on it. Next, he added crowned molding & later (no in-between pictures) a shelf, more trim to the cut edges of the plywood, & molding around the bottom to finish it off. He also added hinges to the faux drawers (where the sink would normally be) & a shelf inside (you can see the inside shelf in the above picture), which hold our video game systems and DVD player.
Here’s a picture with the crowned molding added:
When we bought the bookcases to use for the sides, we thought we would have to create new doors to match the ones on the vanity. However, my husband discovered that the crazy design on the front was just a plastic plate & was easily removed. Once removed, he added molding around the cabinet doors on the bookcases to mimic the doors on the vanity. He also removed the scalloped piece & replaced the top with crowned molding to match the center piece. Then, he added molding to the bottom as well.
Here’s a picture of the bookcase door adjustments:
The final steps were to prime, paint it and add hardware.
Here it is today:
Television Media Center DIY Project
It is a very cool entertainment center, but I had a hard time reading your comments could you adjust them to a darker color to enable better visibility? Thanks, looks great though.