Coat Rack With Zipper Inlay

It's almost a year now since we have moved house and my room still didn't have a coat rack! It would have been fine except for the fact that most of the time I find myself draping shawls and t-shirts over a chair :-/ and sometimes my room resembled a tornado!

My room had plain dark furniture with silver handles, so I wanted something to match that. Very minimalistic.

I have always admired Noahw's instructables and this shelves with inlays has been one of my favorites. I really wanted to try it, and so I did...with zippers as inlays!Those silver metallic zippers really matched my room!

Noah used the 1/8" saw kerf from a table saw blade for the dado of his inlay. If you do not have a table saw you can always use a circular saw. Which is what I did.

A wide plank the length you want

Black with silver metallic zipper - 3' 2" continues zipper or regular zipper which will about to about that length, If you cant get that no problem. you can always glue and attach as it wouldn't show.

wood glue

Saw- hand saw or jig saw

nail

circular saw

circular saw guide - if you don't have one, you can always make like this in step 2

Cut the fabric off your zipper. Then burn the fraying edges. Careful that you don't burn too much!

Mark 45 degree angle every 2" in your 1" square dowels for the hooks.

Cut with saw.

Measure where you want to have your inlay and place guide and clamp. Adjust blade depth so that it would be just enough for guide width and zipper width. Make your first cut. My blade kerf wasn't wide enough for the zipper. So I placed the guide slightly away from the first cut made by the dado and using the zipper as measurement I clamped the guide and made the second cut. It was perfect!

Leave room for the hooks to be placed and repeat above step for the second inlay.

Once that is done, leave on either side of the dado about 1" and cut off excess wood.

Now using a jigsaw or hand saw cut on the sides to match the dado.

Sand all your hooks and plank

Stain the hooks and plank. Glue the zipper in the dado. Cut off excess.

Mark placement for hooks. Drill.

Drill for keyhole hanging hooks at back and fix the hook.

Apply glue and stick the hooks. This would be easier to drill and screw in the hooks.

That's it! Very simple and very minimalistic and I think it looks awesome!

Let me know what you think and all the other options you can have for inlays!

I have to say instructables is helping me think of using unusual things for unusual uses! I never would have thought of using zippers if not for the zipper contest! lol :-)