Hide An Unsightly Water Heater

During my planning of my laundry room remodel, there was one thing that was at the top of my list.  Hide an unsightly water heater.

 

I guess you could say we really should have thought it through better when we were building our house.  Before we knew it, we had this ugly tankless water heater hanging out smack dab in the middle of the wall.  Every time I looked in my laundry room all I saw was that evil thing.  I guess I should be grateful it was a tank less water heater instead of a regular one.  Its all the same though, unsightly in all its glory.

Hide an unsightly water heater:

THE PLAN:

There had to be some way to conceal our water heater and water softener.  I thought of a few different scenarios including: hanging a curtain, and building a pegboard screen, but non of the ideas had that permanent, and INVISIBLE look I was going for.  I wanted them to disappear.  I wanted to conceal them well enough, that anyone looking in this room, would not notice the screening, or concealing materials.

It was decided….a closet, covered in shiplap to match with rest of the walls.  It would make it look deliberate, like it was a natural state of the room, not a sneaky hidden space.

Here is my before:

See that lovely thing on the wall?  What about that giant water softener?  This was not just about a water heater, that over sized water softener had to be hidden too.

We started by building a wall that would divide the space and create the wall to the closet.

We built the frame of the wall with 2 by 4 studs.  We screwed it into the floor joists in the ceiling and drilled it into the concrete floor and bolted it.  We added another vertical stud for more rigidity and stability.

The next step was to install plywood to the framed wall for more support and to give the shiplap  something to be secured to.

Here, the shiplap has been installed over the plywood and is being prepped for paint.

 

Once this part was done, we worked on the door of the closet.  We built the door out of one piece of 1/2 inch plywood.  We didn’t want this door to be too heavy.

We strengthened it by adding 2 by 4 blocks to the left and right sides.  My husband made me hold the door up while he secured it to the wall.  Apparently a 6 ft 5 inch man just doesn’t fit quite as well as I do.  This is one of those rare times that I will put myself in the picture.  There was no other way to get this pic without me in it.

 

We used these hinges, similar to door hinges to hold it up.

The door slightly overlapped the edge of the shiplap wall.  We did this purposely so that we could add a piece of trim that would overlap the wall and create a seamless look.

The last few things we needed to do was paint the door and trim and add a hook and eye closure to keep the door securely shut.

 

Here is a before and after of that corner.  I cannot believe I waited this long to tackle it.  Do you think I succeeded in my goal to hide an unsightly water heater?  I love the way it turned out.  It is exactly how I envisioned it would be.  Once again, I couldn’t have done this without my partner in crime, my hubby.  He is awesome.

So, if you have something you want to conceal, be it a water heater, or anything else, there is always a way to beautify the space and make it work for you.  Don’t settle for what you think you have to.  Make your home your own.  These things can all be done on a budget.  This closet was.

For the cost of 3 sheets of plywood, 8- 2by4 studs, some paint, and hardware, this room was completely transformed.  The result is priceless in my eyes.

Thanks for taking some time out to see what was happening at Twelve On Main.  Have a great day and remember….

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