How To Make A Cheap Room Divider Easily

By Jesse Akre

With the current state of real estate, with homes underpriced, tons of inventory on hand and many mortgages upside down, many people are learning to make do with their current home rather than trading up.

Unfortunately, families have a way of outgrowing their living space, especially as children grow older and space is at a premium. Worse, the once in-demand great rooms in homes can greatly limit the ability to create new space easily and affordably without major reconstruction costs. And who wants to put more money into a home that isn’t even worth what you’re paying for it?

One of the great design secrets is to use room dividers. These can break of a large space into more intimate quarters, such as dividing a dining room from the living room or creating private spaces in a bedroom for children who have to share the room with a sibling.

A cheap room divider is fairly easy to make and it can be both beautiful and functional, if you invest a little time and effort into its design and construction. While you can spend the money to buy a ready-made room divider, we think you’ll like the results of making your own better, since you can customize it to meet your unique needs and the unique constraints of the room you’re adding it to.

Making a cheap room divider is easy, even if you don’t have a lot of construction experience. It requires basic tools such as a drill, electric saw and measuring tape and some off-the-shelf construction materials you can pick up at any home improvement store. There are plenty of instructions for how to create a room divider on the cheap on do it yourself websites. There are so many options we really can’t include them all here.

Before you go too far, look at the different styles and options online. This will help you settle on a design direction. For example, you can go with a Japanese style folding room divider, which is striking in appearance and lets the light shine in through the translucent paper screens. Or you can go with something more opaque and permanent looking. Screens can be permanent or portable, so that’s another important design consideration.

The advantage of a portable screen is you can remove it when entertaining or when you’ve decided that two spaces work better than one. The downside of these screens is that they usually have to be set up with a Z-shape fan fold so they won’t fall over. If you have small children and they knock it down, it can cause serious injury. Instead, you may want to anchor it to at least one wall.

A Japanese style screen will work wonderfully in a room shared by two teens or tweens. It provides immediate privacy without requiring any demolition or permanent installations. And once the kids are grown, simply remove it. These screens are also great for hiding cluttered areas while company is over. Simply set up the screen and all your dirty laundry, hobby supplies or other clutter magically disappears, at least while company is visiting.

If you are used to working with wood, you may want to go with a more grandiose style of screen. Even a wood screen can be done on the cheap, relying on plywood and pre-done trim to do a lot of the magic for you. You can then stain the divider, paint it or, if you’re artistic, use it as a canvas, painting a lovely landscape or seascape or any other design that catches your fancy. An added benefit of doing this is that your visitors won’t even think of it as a screen – it will be a work of art.

Alternately, you can create a divider that will hold family photos. You can do this one of two ways. If you have a miter box or a miter saw, you can use pre-done trim to create photo frames on the divider. Add a little glass or Plexiglas and slip the photo into the slot from the top. You can also purchase ready-made frames and glue them onto the divider. Suddenly, you not only have a new living space but also a wall of memories that you, your family and friends can enjoy every time you pass it.

If you’re not that handy with wood, you can create a room divider with a set of paneled doors that usually go on closets. All you have to do is add a set of hinges between each door panel and voila! – instant room divider. A lot of communities have reclaim centers where you can purchase these panels inexpensively. Thrift stores may have them, too.

Making a cheap room divider is easier to do than you think. Thanks to today’s home improvement stores with their wide selection of materials and accents, you can create a room divider that will make your existing home seem like a new one. It’s one of the least expensive home makeovers you can do.

About the Author: Jesse Akre owns Edenvale Shoppes and hosts numerous furniture and furnishings for any home whether it be towel bars or indoor bench styles and designs.

Source: isnare.com

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