At the beach house, everyone enters through the back door. The area just inside the door becomes a messy drop zone for shoes, packages, jackets and beach gear. To bring some organization to this space, we added a Pottery Barn coat rack last year, as well as a diy rack for fishing poles.
Recently we hacked the Ikea Besta shelf unit for an entry storage bench to bring a little more organization to the space and pretty things up. The unit comes in a variety of door styles and finishes although they no longer sell the style we chose. It measures 4 feet in length, 15 inches deep and 15 inches high
Hubby added a simple base so we could tuck a few pairs of shoes underneath it.
To soften the look, I whipped up two seat cushions using rag rugs from Target and some yarn. I simply folded each rug in half, stitched two of the three sides using a blanket stitch and then went back and “crossed” each stitch to form an “X”. I inserted a 12 x16 -pillow form before sewing up the remaining side. These cushions are sturdy and add some texture to the space. We routinely borrow them to use on our kitchen benches for softer seating.
The cabinet works great for hiding the shoe clutter and makes a nice landing for incoming groceries and parcels.
