Not Too Shabby Darling: In Love With a Ladder...

I fell in love with a ladder. A ladder that isn't used as a ladder. This is the ladder in question:

I followed the pin to credit the original source, but none was found. That makes me sad. Someone should get credit for their beautiful inspiration. Getting credit is something near and dear to my heart, as you may know. If you want to know the whole story, click here.

Anyhoo, I simply had to make one of these ladders! I love the idea! Just one teensy-weensy problem. I don't have an awesome old ladder hanging around. Guess I'll have to build one!

First I decided what size ladder I wanted. I had some 2" x 2" x 8's. To make it easy, I cut one in half. (To prove that I really do use math later in life, that means 2 pieces of wood 24" long.) Then I cut 3 pieces of the 2" x 2" to 12". I wanted to be able to display an 8 x 10 frame between the rungs.

Next I made marks where I wanted the rungs to be, evenly spaced. I forgot to write down the exact measurements, sorry. I used a counter sink drill bit to drill holes for the 2 1/2" screws. Using a counter sink bit will make sure the screw head doesn't stick out from the wood. We don't want a Frankenstein ladder, do we?

Time to assemble the ladder. I used wood glue to hold everything in place and let it dry. I feel it's easier to screw together if the ladder is already one piece.

I used my Ryobi driver to attach the screws.

Time for some stain! Once again, I used Minwax Jacobean stain.

When the stain was all dry, I sanded down the edges to give the ladder an "aged" or "worn" look. I then added some semi-gloss clear coat to "wake-up" the wood. When that was done, I measured out some chicken wire. This stuff is fun to work with, but can be sharp. Wear gloves and use wire cutters to get the amount you want.

The chicken wire was too shiny for my taste, so I whipped out some black spray paint. I just happened to grab my can of High Heat paint, not because I plan on heating the wire, it was just the first can of black I saw. I wasn't meticulous in making sure the black paint covered everything. I just wanted to tone down the "newness" of the wire.

For the next part, I grabbed my staple gun. I then added staples to the back of the ladder to hold the chicken wire in place.

I also added some D-ring hardware (no picture, sorry) to hang the ladder on the wall. I added the hardware so that the ladder can hang horizontal or vertical. Or the ladder can just lean against a wall.

I thought the ladder was missing something, so I added some fun decorative metal pieces.