15 Minute DIY Pot Lid Storage Rack How-To.

This here is a how-to on a 15 minute DIY pot lid storage rack, heh.  Where do you come up with.....?  How can that be, you say?  Fifteen minutes and I've got a rack that organizes my dang messy pile o' pan lids?  Using spare scrap wood even, I say!

Ugh omg....so I inadvertently broke the pot lid storage rack I had purchased a while back, like the uh letter rack type* and now I've just dated myself because who even gets letters anymore....

Doh.

Which ultimately was fine; it was always meant as temporary.  Turns out it was a frustrating tool as the lids always got stuck or in and out was never terribly easy, and it was mayhem.

Because see, Mike came home from his parent's house recently with a couple new-to-us pans and I've gotta find a place to stash 'em. 

And omg suddenly the corner kitchen cabinet storing all our pots and pans overcame me with its inability to functionally store and so rather than get arrgg crabby, I hit the internet for calming, this-isn't-an-entire-kitchen-renovation-over-two-pans solution.

Yay internet!

I mean, sure, I'd be more than happy to renovate the kitchen because the tile floor is awful and grout is falling out and tiles are loose and if grout is falling out and I have to remove said grout to repair, I may as well do a new floor, right?

Well if I'm replacing the floor, the cabinets would have to come out so, may as well get some cabinets I actually like, right?

And if the cabinets have to come out, that means the counter comes up too and since I loooaathe this particular granite, may as well get new counters, it's not that much square footage really anyway.

Hahahaaaaaa......

.....Welcome to how my brain compartmentalizes a tremendous project into something that's unquestionably a simple task.

Ok Becky, take a breather honey, pot lids.  Pot lid mess.  Fix.  Now.

See, sometimes I find ready-made storage solutions make the problem worse in that, ok, here we go, they take up more space and provide less storage.  Or are overly contrived to make you think they're helping with a price tag to match.  One size fits all solutions don't fit all.

So I found this from Fix This Build That and thought it was clever but sadly, after spending much too much time tinkin' around with the idea, I realized it wasn't going to work on our very narrow doors.  Maybe it'll work for you though!

Onto this thought, that thought, the other thought, and several hours later I opted to take that door idea and turn it into a stand idea, one that will sit atop the shelf, at least until I entirely reorganize that cabinet yet again for the hundredth thousandth time, or the cabinets come out.  *Cough, ahem.*

Easy enough to pop together and seriously, I used scrap wood for this.  Soooo technically, this project was free-to-me.  That's right, a free DIY pot lid storage rack!  HaHA!

If you don't have a gathering of scrap wood, do not fret, my friend.  Most every home improvement store has a section of small piece scrap wood that they sell for couch change.

Of course your circumstances and cabinet and lid dimensions may vary from mine but the gist is a little piece of 1x6 cut to two pieces of 6" (so 5 1/2" tall and 6" wide) and a few pieces of wood lath (Iiiiiii knooowwww!  I'm trying to use it up!  Honestly!!) (Ahhh man, I'm totally gonna end up as the Crazy Wood Lath Lady, aren't I?!)

Simple supplies, check.

Ok, measured two inches in from one side, then 1/8" on either side of the 2" mark for a 1/4" wide slot and then 1 1/2" down, aka, the dimensions of the wood lath.  Another 2" over, marked for another 1/4" wide slot.  My dad's old combination square* made it easy to draw it out.

Lines drawn, let's cut.

Over to the spiffy band saw and I zipped those slots out.  Perhaps not perfect but eh, whatev's.  Slots they are, hold the wood lath they do.

Aaaannd cut.

Next up, chopped the wood lath into 22 1/2" strips.

Dabbled a little glue into the slot....oh I used that PC Universal glue* because though it didn't work on the foyer light fixture, it does stick yet glue is glue is glue* here.

Lots of broken skewers floating around from my Wood Dowel Vase project, heh.

Slide the lath strip in, easy peasy.  Or maybe bang it in with a rubber mallet* if it's tight.

Mmmmmk.  Since I'm not trying to win any design awards here, I tacked a strip of lath onto the top edge on one side and then the other with dabs o' glue and my nail gun* and guess the freak what, I have a pot lid rack.

My camera has like 30,000 focus points or something ridiculous and it always picks the wrong point.  Sorry for the blurry shot.

Bam, done!

Whoa.  Wow!

I know, that was fast, right?! 

As with most projects I present you, stain it, seal it, paint it, put stickers on it, don't do anything; it's totally a customizable gig.

Originally I made one with 4" wide pieces of 1x6 and while that worked, it didn't hold everything so now I've got two racks in the cabinet.  Ya know, toaster oven tray, silicone lids* to cut down on plastic wrap, lids for glass Ikea containers to cut down on plastic containers.  Snuck in an environmentally friendly, sustainability angle here too, ah, nice.

Ugh, ok, I should not have gone to the Ikea site.  Ugh.  Cabinets.  Ugh Ikea.  Let's redo the house!

Tada!  Problem created, problem fixed, no leaving the house.  haha

Ok.  So does this lid rack work?  By golly yes it does.  

And while it takes up about the same footprint of the wire rack itself, it takes up less space footprint-wise overall as the lids are stored in-line parallel with the rack rather than perpendicular to the rack's base.  So really, I gained a lot of cabinet space back.  Niiice. 

We'll see how well it functions, ya know on a groggy Sunday morning when Mike reaches for a pan lid while making breakfast.  If it's a smooth operator, we're golden.  If I get a groggy morning stink eye, well, it'll be time for plan b, or whatever letter I'm onto now.

Not too bad for a 15 minute DIY storage rack fix at the last minute though, eh?  

Did I get the two pans in yet?  Nope.  The gerbils are a'-whirl in my head over that cabinet still....There has got to be a better way with these dang corner cabinets, right?!

hahahaaaaaa

*The pot and pan lid racks, PC Products glue, and suction silicone lids are Amazon affiliate links.  The combination squares, wood glue, rubber mallets, and nail guns are Home Depot affiliate links.  Mwah, thanks!  Please see the "boring stuff" tab for more info.