DIY Produce Rack
Hey everyone! It’s Katie from Addicted 2 DIY again! I’ve got a great project to share with you all to store your summer bounty. I’ve been looking for a way to store fresh produce for a while. It was driving me crazy storing everything on my kitchen counter or having it get lost in the pantry. Forgotten potatoes start to smell pretty bad after a while. I stumbled across some adorable wire baskets in the Target dollar spot a few months ago for only $3 apiece! At that price, I bought several and figured I’d find some way to use them. I thought they would be perfect to store fruit and vegetables, so I built this simple DIY produce rack using some scrap wood in the garage.
Supplies:
- 1 – 1×6 @ 6′ long
- 1 – 1×4 @ 8′ long
- 2 – 5 gallon paint sticks
- miter saw
- staple gun
- 3/4″ staples
- wood glue
- wood stain
- chalk paint
- adhesive vinyl
- Farmer’s Market Silhouette cut file
- wire baskets
- screw eyes
- drywall anchors and screws (I used 75lb anchors)
- D-ring picture hangers
Cut the 1×6 into two 31″ pieces and the 1×4 into one 31″ piece. Cut the paint sticks in half.
Glue and nail the paint sticks to the back of the boards using 3/4″ staples. You can also use a brad nailer and 5/8″ brad nails if you don’t have a staple gun.
For a weathered finish, stain the boards with a dark stain and then dry brushed chalk paint onto the wood until satisfied with the look. Allow the stain to dry overnight and then you can dry brush it the next day.
To dry brush, add a tiny amount of paint to your paint brush and dab the excess off onto a paper towel, then brush it in even strokes on your wood. It is a great technique to make your new wood look decades old.
The beauty of dry brushing, is that you can add as much or as little as you like. If you mess it up, just sand it down with steel wool or sandpaper.
If you’d like to use the Farmer’s Market Silhouette Cut File, size it to fit onto your wood and cut your image out. Weed the letters and use transfer paper to place the design onto your wood. Unfortunately, I could only share this file as a Silhouette file as the font would not transfer over to an SVG file. Gotta love technology!
Stencil your image using any color of paint you like. I used black chalk paint and then distressed it a bit with 80 grit sandpaper.
Pre-drill the holes for the screw eyes to ensure they go in straight and the wood doesn’t split. Make sure you use a bit small enough to allow the screws to get a good bite into the wood when you screw them in.
Attach two D-ring hangers to the back of the wood to hang on the wall. Use heavy duty drywall anchors and insert them into the wall in the desired location to hang your produce rack. When screwing the screws into the drywall anchors, don’t screw them all of the way in. This will allow the d-rings to hang easily onto the screws.
Hang it on your wall and fill with your favorite fruits and veggies that are best stored at room temperature.
I can’t even begin to tell you how happy I am to not have all of these fruits and veggies taking up counter space anymore! And I love how this looks on the wall in my kitchen. I’ve gotten tons of compliments when friends and family come over. Hopefully next year I’ll have my own garden planted and I can fill the baskets with home-grown fruits and vegetables.
