Garage Shelving

These are pictures of some wall to wall garage shelving I made for Jennifer in Belmont.

I originally made these shelves for her neighbor, David, down the road - actually they weren't for David, but for David's mother.  David had me build them for her while she was away, as a surprise!  What a great son!  Jennifer was thinking about having me build her wall to wall cabinets, but then decided to go with the shelves after seeing them in David's mothers' garage.

David, I believe, had four shelves, which were about 16 inches deep.  The spacing between his shelves were similar to the ones shown here but his mothers garage was taller making room for a fourth shelf, the idea being to utilize the maximum amount of vertical storage space.  Jennifer, however, chose to utilize all of the room next to her garage door by having me build her shelves at 22 inches deep.

To keep costs down, I made both sets of shelves out of sanded B&C plywood, instead of cabinet grade oak, or birch.  Unpainted, the plywood looks like the kind of utility grade plywood someone would put on the roof or wall of a house, but it comes with a smooth sanded side (the "B" side), that when painted looks almost as good as a more expensive plywood.

The shelves are supported in the back by 1x2 that has been screwed to the studs in the wall for strength.  The support's that are visible in the front are each made of two 1x2's that are nailed end to middle to make a "T", for strength, and most importantly, are installed underneath the plywood surface for incredible support.  Too many times I've seen people make shelves and nail single 1x2's, or 2x4's, to the front edge of the shelf, and over time the nail or screw simply breaks out.

For both David, and Jennifer, I was able to demonstrate the strength of the shelves by climbing up on them and lying down on the top shelf!  They really are strong!

David painted his mother's shelves for her, and I painted these for Jennifer.