The day is here at last!!

I have been SO eager to share this DIY project with you for two reasons… One, I made this MYSELF! And two, I am joining an AMAZING group of bloggers to bring you the first ever Home Depot Gift Challenge. Each month, we will chose one home depot product and create a unique gift. We are not associated with Home Depot, we just really like their products :) This month, our choices led me to creating this DIY industrial Copper Wine Rack for my husband.

It all started with this little copper tee. We were all challenged to make something for our significant other that had to incorporate these copper tees. My mind was spinning immediately, and although I definitely drink more wine in this home than my husband, I knew he would appreciate this industrial piece in our kitchen!

Here’s what you need:

(everything 1/2 inch diameter)

4 Copper Tees

12 Copper Elbows (90 degree)

3 Copper pipes

4 Copper Clamps

4 Short Screws

Tube Cutter

Measuring Tape

Marker/Pen

90 Degree Ruler

Epoxy

Something to spread/mix Epoxy

(I used tiny wooden sticks)

To start you have to measure everything to make sure that this piece can hang properly from your cupboards. Cupboard depth and length, wine bottle length and diameter.

One I had all my measurements, I made this sketch [below] by hand and calculated everything I needed.

Based on my measurements (for a standard cupboard), I needed to cut the copper into:

2 x 14″

4 x 3.5″

4 x 2″

4 x 4″4 x 5.5″

I cut each piece by measuring it with the tape measure, marking my cut with a marker, and cutting with the tube cutter [thanks to the handy hubby for the tutorial on that!].

Once each piece was cut, I gently sanded the edges, so that they would slide into the joints nicely.

Next I did a dry fit to check that all my measurements were right. I’m SO glad I did this! If you saw in my photo above, I had originally planned to cut the width pieces at 7″ instead of 5.5″. When I did the dry fit, I realized that the wine bottles would have slid right out of the rack! Lucky I hadn’t glued anything yet!!

Now you can glue!

Mix your epoxy (as per instructions) – only a small amount at a time – and spread inside your joints. Join the pieces together, and push them against a flat surface to make sure that both joints off each pipe are at the same angle.

Finally, use your 90 degree ruler to make sure that everything is level and square.

Add your clamps to the top bars, and bask in your beautiful masterpiece before you hang it up!

Since this is a GIFT challenge, I couldn’t show of my gift without showing off my wrapping job!

I used approx. 1″ washers and stamped “FOR”, “MY”, and “MAN”. into the washers in lieu of a tag. See the post on How to Stamp on Metal to learn more :)

Not gonna lie, my husband had to hang his own gift after he opened it, lol.

He measured a short distance from the back of the wall, and used eight small screws to hang the wine rack from the cupboard above. Ensure that the screws are shorter than the thickness of the board you are attaching it to. That way the screws won’t pierce the board on the inside.

The copper wine rack easily holds six bottles of wine :) Or whatever else you choose to put it in!

The photo below shows how the bottles sit against the wall at the back, about half an inch of space between the wall and the wine rack :)

And it all started with this simple copper tee!

Now it’s time for me to grab a glass and enjoy our new wine rack!

As I mentioned before, there was an AMAZING group of bloggers that joined me in finding creative uses for those Home Depot copper tees.

Click the pictures below to discover more outstanding projects :)

{xoxo}