Barn Wood Faced Dresser Ikea Hack

Every once in a while a project just comes together and works out better than I imagined it would. Barely every once in a while. This project was just that. My inspiration for this project came from West Elm:

I looooove this piece and with a boy about to turn 12 it would be perfect in his room. If it wasn’t for that darn price tag. Priming for an IKEA hack, right? I bought the MALM dresser:

A friend had this awesome barn wood from her uncles cabin in beautiful Moab, Utah she gave to me. No joke.

And from there it just all fell together. Here are the steps:

Remove 1/4 inch from the front of the drawers. I used a planer, which worked like a charm. If you don’t have a planer option you can cut it with a band saw, use a fence to guide a straight cut. If you don’t have a planer or a band saw glue to barn wood directly to the face, it just won’t be flush with the dresser and will stick out a little bit.
Prepare the barn wood: Start by cutting the front of the barn wood to 1/4 inch. Then cut the wood down to size. This is the funnest part because barn wood is just so freakin’ cool.
Prepare the drawer faces, for the West Elm look use two boards on each drawer face. If there are holes you can see the pressed board through spray paint the face before gluing the barn wood.
Glue barn wood to the drawer face, use a fine finishing brad nail to secure board to the face.
Use a router to trim any extra edges and add a lacquer or finish spray.
Assemble the ikea dresser and then stand back and feel super rad because this project is AMAZING!