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Ballard and PB Inspired Wire Wall Basket

Aloha!

Here’s my tutorial for the DIY Ballard- and PB-Inspired Wire Wall Baskets (in case you missed it over at Infarrantly Creative last week).

I opened my Ballard and PB magazines again this week, and these two items caught my attention:

Pottery Barn
Ballard Design
So I went ahead and made a few of these:


Here’s what you’ll need:

1) Hardware cloth (wire mesh thingie stuff). I bought mine at a small local hardware store. It’s 2′ x 10′ and cost just under $8.

 2) Wire cutter thingies. I found these in my husband’s tool stash. If yours doesn’t have one, just ask your local hardware store for wire cutter thingies, and they’ll send you to the right section. 😉

 3) Floral wire. I used both 20 gauge and 26. The 26 was cheaper and worked better. Sweet. 😉

First, you will need to decide what size you want your baskets to be, and draw up a little sketch, so you can measure and cut one piece out. I used sizes close to the Ballard and PB hanging baskets, but I also created a few small ones for my daughters who insisted they needed them to play “Red Riding Hood”, and I made a few for our hall closet that are 5″ wide x 4″ tall x 11″ deep to put nail polish and hair frillies in.

The wall ones I made measured 12″ wide x 4″ deep x 10″ tall. I calculated that to wrap a piece around the 10″ tall back and 4″ deep bottom and 10″ tall front, I would need 24″. PERFECT since the “cloth” is 24″ wide.  I cut across one side 20″ (12″ wide front plus two 4″ “wings” that will be the sides).

Here’s what it looked like after being cut out (Step 1 for anyone who’s counting):

UPDATE — HERE’S A PIC WITH THE MEASUREMENTS FOR ANYONE WHO WANTS IT REALLY SPELLED OUT.

 Step 2: Make your creases/folds along the “wings” and then around the bottom and up the back.

Step 3: Unfold and give it a little bit of shape. Don’t stress too much about the form, though, until after we “sew” the sides together.

Step 4: Cut your floral wire about 1.5x the size of the side you’re going to sew up. So for your 4″ sides, cut it about 6″. For the 12″ side, cut it about 18″.

Start at one end, and pull the wire almost all the way through. Leave about 1″ hanging out, and wrap through that first square a couple times, then weave it up the side. I hit every square because I preferred the look, but every other also gets a good effect and saves on time…totally up to you.

Step 5: Trim the ends of your wire, and shape your basket out! Easy as that. So for less than $3, and in under 1 hour, I saved $75-90 (depending on the catalog we’re hacking here)!

 And here they are all prettied up in my mom cave. I created a few labels and printed them out on photo paper, cut them out and then cut out a piece of fabric and sandwiched the mesh and some hot glue between the label and the fabric. Easy to swap out, looks like funky chalkboard paint, but no dust. 🙂

 Curious how I hooked them to the walls??  I researched extensively, tried numerous hooks and nails, and eventually I came up with an innovative idea…wait for it… STAPLES!  Yep. Good ol’ staple gun across the top. Leaves tiny holes, so they’re super easy to hide and/or paint over without patching when the time comes. I’m sure there are a million other ways to hang them, but this is what I had on hand, and it got the job done.

Check out what else I decided to craft up for some of them:

Ahhh… Lovin’ the pleated ruffles and contrast of the drop cloth and wire mesh. I’m actually jealous of my magazines. 🙂

I even made a few smaller ones for our hair accessories:

Here’s the link for the pleated liners.

And here’s the link for the hair accessories baskets.

So with the one $8 hardware cloth, I made 3 large baskets, 3 small baskets, and I also used a couple feet for another project I’ll be showing later.

Total cost per large basket with pleated liner is approximately $1.50. The small baskets are about $.75 WITH liners. Pretty awesome, right?

Comparison: 
My three baskets:  $4.50
Three PB Baskets: $72
Three Ballard Baskets: $87

(And mine have liners…)

PLUS…you can customize mine for any space! Pretty stinking awesome!!

Aloha,
charlie

My DIY Baskets/liners are participating in the $5 competition on the CSI Project. 🙂

Visit thecsiproject.com

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Comments

  7. 1. Love the basket. Especially the one with the drop cloth lining.

    2. A friend from church has just moved back home to Hawaii and I really miss his testimony at church about living Aloha. Just seeing your blog title made me smile.

    Reply

  17. Found you on the CSI project! You are super creative! I love it! I've been wanting some wire baskets as well! Thanks for sharing this project! I am totally going to start following you now!! {why does that always sound super creepy?? ha!}

    Reply

  34. I love this idea and especially love the liner you made for the basket! Suz at Inspiring Creativeness sent me the Versatile Blogger award and I'm sending it to you. Please visit my blog to get the details.
    Lesa at Home-Frosting.blogspot.com

    Reply

  37. uhm, I think this is the greatest tutorial I have ever seen! Imagine! I can make any basket in any size I want! Oh why does it have to be 7pm on Sunday night?!? i so badly need to run to hardware store!!!!!!!!! I would love love love if you would come link this up (and the liner tutorial too) @ my Sew Crafty Party!!! Yay…see stuff like this is why I blog! Take that grossly overpriced department stores! lol

    http://wildflowersandwhimsy.blogspot.com/2011/02/sew-crafty-saturday.html

    Reply

  39. thank you for such a clever idea. i had no idea i needed these so badly. i am sure to be making a bunch. and they will of course need liners right? metal and fabric come together … two of my faves. thank you.
    i also might go so far as to try some chicken coop wire too.
    daring as that is!
    xow.

    Reply

  41. I love this! I recreated some Ballard Designs office file cabinets last week – originally $60 bucks for each basket and I made them for $20. You have such great ideas and I'm your newest follower! I'd love it if you'd follow me back: http://stillwaterstory.blogspot.com/

    Again, you did a fantastic job with these!! 🙂

    Reply

  58. That's very, very clever. My husband has some leftovers from his previous project and I sure hope I get the time to make some of these. Thanks for sharing. 🙂

    Adin B

    Reply

  67. I was wondering what to do with all my plastic, paper and gift bags. I decided I wanted to store them on the wall in my laundrey area, so I searched the net. Everything is so expensive, but I found your page, so awesome! I will be making these this weekend. Thanks!

    Reply

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