DIY Budget Friendly Corbel Shelves
Why We Made This DIY
We were making a plan to put some shelves up in our living room, and I knew I didn’t want them to be floating or use basic metal brackets. I wanted these shelves to lean vintage in design and have a little character, so we thought we would try to make some corbel shelves. After checking the hardware store’s corbel options we determined they were way too expensive, especially because we were planning on making 4 shelves (needing 8 corbels in total). So as it usually goes, we decided we would make our own on a budget!
Materials & Cuts
These are the sizes and types of boards we chose to use, however, you can of course make whatever size you would like and simply use these instructions as a loose template.
1x6” Pine Boards - for the actual shelves & the shaped part of the corbel
0.5 x 2” Pine Boards - for the corbel support pieces
We used 1x6 pine boards for both the actual shelves and the shaped part of the corbels. You should plan out the desired length of your shelves to determine what length boards you need to get, and make sure there is additional length for to use to make your corbels. It might be a good idea to get a little extra in case you make a mistake designing and cutting out your corbel pieces.
First, start by cutting the boards to the size shelf you would like, and you will use the remainder of the boards to make the corbels. To make the corbels, you might want to start by drawing your design on a piece of paper or cardboard, then cut it out. This will be your stencil you will use to draw your corbel shapes out onto your board.
Note: I did not make a stencil for this project at first, and it did not go so well. I made the mistake of cutting out the first corbel and using each corbel to trace the next corbel, and so on, and my corbels slowly kept getting bigger. You will want to use the same exact stencil for each corbel to keep the size consistent.
Once you have your stencil, trace your design onto your board (make sure you have the grain of the wood going the right way.) You can then use a jigsaw to cut out your corbel. Sand down the edges to give the corbel a nice smooth curve.
To make the corbel connection peices, you will need to use the 0.5x2” pine boards. You will need a piece that goes in between your main corbel piece and the shelf (the top piece) and a piece that goes in between the main corbel and the wall (the back piece).
The top piece is cut to overhang the front of the corbel a 1/2 inch, and it lines up with the back of the corbel. Meaning the length of your top connection piece should be the length of the top of your corbel plus 1/2 an inch.
The back support piece is a little longer than the top piece. It overhangs from the corbel 1/2 inch at the bottom and it comes above the corbel by 1/2 inch to line up with the top corbel (see photos). Meaning, this cut should be the height of your corbel plus 1 inch. You can line up the top piece with the corbel to make sure you are cutting the back piece the exact length you need. I then rounded out the edges of these pieces with a sander so it would look more cohesive with the corbel.
Assembly
We assembled the corbels so you would see the least amount of screws as possible (only two screws are visible). To do this, the order of assembly is very important.
First, you will want to pre-drill all 7 screw holes using a countersink bit so that your shelf can lie flat on the corbel, and the corbel can lie flat against the wall. The picture below shows where each screw is located. If you don’t have a countersink bit, you can drill a pilot hole all the way through, and then drill a larger hole only part of the way through the wood. There are many tutorials online for this.
Once you have predrilled all your holes, you will connect the main corbel piece to the back connection piece (holes A1 and A2). You need the corbel to be in the center of the back piece (1/4 inch on either side), and for there to be 1/2 inch overhang on the top and bottom. You may need to get creative clamping the corbel to the back piece since there may be no flat parts. Fortunately, the screw holes will not be visible on the back piece, since it will be against the wall, so if if you make a mistake, it should be okay.
Before attaching the top connection piece to the corbel, you will screw the corbel with the already attached back piece to the wall. We made sure our shelves lined up to the studs because we did not want to deal with drywall screws. Using the 2 pre-drilled holes (B1 and B2), screw the back piece (which should already be attached to the corbel) to the wall. If your shelf is using 2 or more corbels for support, make sure you install them all level with each other at this time.
Now you can screw in the top connection piece to the rest of the corbel using the two pre-drill holes you already made (holes C1 and C2). When you add this top piece it covers up one of the screws that went into the wall. Make sure the top piece is flush with the back piece, and that it is centered on the corbel (1/4 inch on either side)
Now that your corbels are up you can put on your shelf! Place your 2x6" on the corbels, and again make sure everything is level and even on both sides. Attach the shelf from the front bottom of the top connection piece, where you have the last pre-drilled hole (hole D1).
That’s it! That is how we used minimal materials to make our own unique corbel shelves on a budget. Have fun creating your own!
Note: the stain color we used is Honey.
