Ikea Malm Dresser Hack

Ikea furniture tend to be on the minimalism design spectrum which is great because it gives you a blank canvas to transform any piece into something uniquely yours. I have read about many Malm Dresser transformation that included painting or stenciling the dresser into a different color. I kept my dresser white with the goal being to increase amount of storage I can get out of this dresser and to introduce more warm gold accent colors into my bedroom that has primarily cool colors.

Here are simple steps to transform the Ikea Malm dresser from Plain Jane to polished elegance.

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WHAT YOU WILL NEED:

I bought two Malm Dressers with the four drawers. The reason I love the Malm Dresser is because the drawers are really big and deep allowing for a lot of space for storage.

Next I placed the two dressers together without gluing or attaching them. What I used to keep them together is the Ikea Malm glass top. Make sure you buy the size that is 63″ by 18″ as that is the length that will cover both Malm dressers. There is a shorter version of this glass but it will only cover one dresser. The way you mount the glass is very simple, you just place it over the two dressers and that’s it. No tools required for this step. Word of caution, do not lean a mirror on top of your dress once you have the glass top installed. Your mirror will slide down and break because the glass top is very smooth surface . I had this happen and it is very frustrating watching my mirror slide of break before I could reach it to make it stop happening. My recommendation if you will be using a mirror above your Malm dresser is to secure it to your wall.

NOW FOR THE FUN PART:

Dress up your drawers with some fun hardware. If you are going to go with standard hardware length, I recommend buy this Hardware Mounting template this will help with not having to measure each drawer to install hardware. You simple place the template onto your drawer, mark the location of the length you want and use a drill to drill your holes. Since the length of my hardware was not standard, we had to do it the hard way and measure each drawer to find the appropriate, leveled and centered location to drill two holes. Majority of Mounting templates have the two farthest holes for hardware 5 inches apart. Mine was about 6 in. apart. I think next time I will keep it to a standard size as measuring and installing eight drawer handles took a lot longer than what it would taken with the template.

My favorite hardware that I have used are listed below. Hardware will dictate the esthetics of your Malm dresser. I went with a more modern sleek design but you are looking to add more traditional touches then I would look into hardware the has curves and traditional design esthetic.

What do you think? Simple enough?

The dresser really does not like an Ikea dresser and I really enjoyed the creative process of transforming it into what I have envisioned my bedroom needed.

For a wallpaper project on how to transform a power room on a minimal budget click here.