( 
)
You may not have heard of Ikea Hacking* or know what an Ikea Hack* is, but Ikea Hackers compose a large active community of very creative people that repurpose, redesign, remake, or somehow reuse Ikea products for a new or improved purpose. These Ikea Hackers have blogs, contests, and connect with other Ikea Hackers, sharing their work with each other and the world. They partake in a Do It Yourself (DIY) style of artistic expression designing, crafting, and imagining that an already existing ready to assemble furniture piece or accessory from Ikea could be made into something different. They use their Ikea purchase more as raw material, imagining it as something better, more useful, or that it could be made sturdier. Their projects are redesigns which return a unique, one of a kind - an original. Ikea hacks repurpose the Swedish unassembled goods not only for something new or different, but in many instances something bizarre - like taking a counter top and creating a guitar out of it.
If you Google Ikea Hack, or Ikea Hacker you are returned thousands of results. It's a fascinating culture, which piqued our interest when reading an article about this fascinating activity.
We are not Ikea Hackers, maybe one day we'll give it a try, but we are Habitat Hackers. A term we coined after reading about Ikea Hackers. At that moment we felt a connection with the Ikea Hacker mindset. The desire to create, to repurpose, make something better.
In our spare time we love to visit the Habitat for Humanities stores. You've probably heard of the charity responsible for building and rehabilitating homes around the world for those that are not able to do so for themselves. Habitat's contribution is remarkable in the least in the fight against poverty. People can bring donations of raw building materials, light fixtures, furniture, appliances, just about anything that could be used to make a home or used in construction to a Habitat Store in one of many locations. The store resells these materials to raise money for their incredible charity. Some of the materials are brand new, some are part of something else, and some are damaged. We saw the beauty in the pieces, some that would otherwise have no use and decided to make something useful from them. Many of the products were made from rich woods, and veneers, had unique hardware or were hand carved. These pieces along with random floor tiles, and other odds and ends called us to imagine ways to use these beautiful parts to make something useful. So began our journey into Habitat Hacking.
Our first project was to build a bar in our home where we previously had a wall separating our kitchen and living room. We love sitting at the bar and it has become the social gathering place for our family and friends. We eat, talk, read there, and when the children were young, it provided an excellent place for them to sit and talk or snack while mom worked in the kitchen. We removed the wall that separated our kitchen and living area, leaving a large opening. We purchased a top half of an entertainment center from the Habitat Store cut it in half vertically, and redesigned it. We put shelves in it, put a granite top on it, added lucite crystal knobs, and brass hinges. We then built it into the large opening we created and sheet rocked around it to completely build it into the structure of our home. Voila! We had a bar. The half entertainment center piece cost $35, and the granite tiles cost about $135. We created a beautiful, quality built-in piece of furniture with functional storage space. It became so incredibly satisfying to save an otherwise unusable piece of furniture and at the same time contribute a little to a fantastic charity. This process seemed to reach the heart of recycling, only better. We were hooked and we wanted more - what a fantastic fun way to take part in the green movement. We recycled, reused, restored, repurposed, got what we wanted, and donated a bit along the way.
See the beautiful veneer work - couldn't waste that!
View from the opposite side - looks like it's always been there.
Our second project was building an entertainment center for our stereo and TV out of half of another entertainment center. The popularity of flat screen TV's is taking over the use of older conventional sets, stored in their tall cumbersome entertainment centers. They are becoming a thing of the past. We took the top half of an old style entertainment center, turned it upside down, added shelves with decorative brackets, put a fine grade plywood top on it (remember the bottom of the top half is now the top), added molding around the edges, put in a center support, stained it and once again have a fine piece that fits our needs. We have about $125 total in that piece.
Used to be the top half (turned upside down) of an entertainment center
We have enjoyed our two Habitat Hack jobs so much. We will definitely be looking for more ways to reuse, and repurpose. Join in the fun. The once very popular clothing and TV armoires can be found at resale stores, second hand shops, and the Habitat Store. Imagine something better and get busy. Recycling can be fun and satisfying, economical, and now charitable as well!
*To define hack or hacking for the purposes of this eBay guide means: a very good, and perhaps very time-consuming, piece of work that produces exactly what is needed.
Thank you for voting. If your vote meets our 
