Under Stair Closet Turned Butler’s Pantry

September 19, 2012

This is a project close to 5 years in the making. It has nagged me and taunted me for all of those years.

I’ll never forget the first time I saw this door. We were touring the house and I walked past it and did a double take. It didn’t even have my cute little Corn Husk Wreath on it and I still knew that there was something special about it! Where did this door lead?

Upon opening it, I discovered a wonderful set of corner shelves and further in, a strange little closet that was obviously built under the stairs.

Here’s how it looked before.

4.5 years later I’m ready to reveal it under it’s new name. “The Butler’s Pantry” I can call it that right? I was kind of jealous of the one my friend Karianne has.

And since I seem to be the maid around here, I thought I could at least pretend that there is a Butler somewhere too, right?Here is how it looks now!

The walls were painted using the leftover paint from the Mudroom Makeover.

In the photo below, can you see the little doorway there on the left? That leads to another “room” where it is obvious that you are underneath the staircase.

You almost feel like you are going through the wardrobe in “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”. If that wardrobe had paper towels on a shelf inside of it.

We ripped up the old carpet and put down peel and stick laminate wood which is really close to the color of my real wood floors in the kitchen. It totally opens up the space now!

wood floor, peel and stick, laminate floor

Looking straight ahead, you used to be greeted by a blank wall. But not anymore! Sigh…don’t you just love vintage silver trays?

I think I love them even more when they are hung on a wall in a grouping!

silver trays, vintage silver trays on wall

Once inside, it is easier to see how awkward this little space really is. My goal was to see how I could make the most of the strange angles of the walls and the obvious “tiered” effect of the ceiling.

Adding metal shelving gave me the storage space I needed and I made a little “skirt” for the middle rack out of a drop cloth and attached it using velcro.

I really wanted to do something fun with those “tiers” in the ceiling so I made a hanging wine rack using an old cabinet door.

On the bottom shelf we placed our wine fridge. Awww yeah!

Hmmmm….I see two bottles in there. Anyone wanna come over and help me celebrate this project being done?

By putting a tray on the top shelf I was able to add some decorative interest and also help disguise what is on the middle shelf.

Gotta keep it real here folks!

And did you see my little chalkboard there?

Would you believe it used to be this? This TV tray has been in our lives since we were first married and had no furniture and my parent’s took pity on us and gave us one from there set so that we had something on which to put our tiny TV.
So, it literally was a TV tray. I can feel you rolling your eyes at my weak joke. But, yuck. Look how gnarly that thing looked. It was begging to be transformed!

I took the legs off, gave it a couple of coats of chalkboard paint and then painted the edges white.

This is one of our most favorite wines so I’m guessing that it might be the “wine of the day” every day!

Up above, we are rocking it old school style with a basic light bulb fixture and pull string. We didn’t want to pay to have an electrician change it out so I simply turned a cute little lampshade upside down to disguise the light bulb. And now I could insert all sorts of “yanking your chain” jokes…but I won’t!

On the other side of the closet (oops…I mean Butler’s Pantry!) we have these wonderful built-in shelves.

Baskets hold cleaning supplies and I created another little curtain on one shelf using more drop cloth and a tension rod. It disguises some of my items that aren’t quite “display worthy”.

Well, there you have it. My Under Stair Closet/Butler’s Pantry! I love it so.Even if my husband said very sarcastically (but with a wink in his eye), “Good thing this room is so beautiful now since so many people go in there all the time.”

The Butler and I were very insulted!

Thanks so much for joining us at the Fence today!

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