DIY I lined up a tin of Liberon wax and a tin of V33 varnish on the workbench to settle which brand was better, turned them both round, and found...
Manual activities will not scare you anymore
Do-it-yourself often invites itself into the house, whether it is to repair something in particular, to make a piece of furniture or to improve an already existing tool, DIY will serve you well.
By expanding your knowledge in this field, you will be able to do many DIY projects for your home.
No need to go to the store, you will just have to gather the necessary materials and get to work!
Customizing Home Textiles: Dylon vs Rit Dye Techniques
DIY Two curtain panels, one dye bath, the same afternoon. One came out the deep olive I'd been picturing for months. The other came out streaked and...
Creating an Ergonomic Home Office Space: Ergotron vs Varidesk Products
DIY Before you go shopping for a Varidesk, one small thing: that company hasn't been called Varidesk since February 2020. It rebranded as Vari, and...
Customizing Your Dinnerware: Pebeo vs Marabu Painting Techniques
DIY A stack of plain white plates for a few euros at a weekend brocante, in a corner of the coast that has been firing pottery since long before...
Building a Custom Bookshelf: IKEA Billy Hack vs Lerberg Shelves
DIY IKEA reckoned in 2023 that a Billy bookcase leaves a shop somewhere in the world every five seconds, and that more than 140 million of them have...
DIY Vertical Garden: Gardena vs Hozelock Irrigation Systems Compared
DIY Everybody's first vertical garden dies the same way. The plants at the bottom drown, the plants at the top go crisp, and the owner concludes...
Creating Wall Decorations: Cricut vs Silhouette – Which Tool to Choose
DIY Everyone compares these two on cutting force and blade types, and almost nobody mentions the thing you will actually be arguing with at eleven...
Making an Industrial Coffee Table: Home Depot Materials vs Leroy Merlin
DIY There is a lovely irony buried in this comparison. Leroy Merlin exists because a couple in the Pas-de-Calais started reselling American army...
Tutorial: Making a Pendant Light – Philips Hue vs IKEA TRÅDFRI
DIY A friend hung a beautiful rattan shade over her dining table in Vieux Nice last spring and spent an entire evening choosing the bulb. What...
DIY Jewelry Making: Miyuki Beads vs Swarovski Beads
DIY Almost every guide you'll find comparing these two beads was written before the ground moved underneath it, twice. Once in 2021, when Swarovski...
How to sew a cushion cover in a few simple steps?
DIY The first cushion covers I ever made were technically perfect and looked awful. Straight seams, neat corners, and a sad flat pillow inside, like...
DIY: How to make a modular and original shelf?
DIY Modular shelving fails in two places, and almost never where people expect. It is not the design that lets you down, and it is rarely the wood....
How to create a light fixture from salvaged objects?
DIY Every Monday the Cours Saleya in Nice swaps its flowers for antiques, and around 180 dealers spread out everything from ships' lanterns to...
Pros and cons of painting your walls yourself
DIY Painting your own walls saves money. Less of it than most people assume, and for a reason nobody mentions in the aisle of the DIY store: in...
DIY: How to make an original and inexpensive headboard?
DIY Half the bedrooms I get asked about are in rented flats, which means the wall behind the bed is off limits, or nearly. That constraint turns out...
How to recycle old glass bottles to make decorative containers?
DIY Every September I end up with the same embarrassing row of empty rosé bottles on the balcony, plus the jars from a summer of making apricot jam....
5 Mistakes to Avoid for DIY Van Builders
DIY Every self-build starts with the same sentence: give me three months and it will be done. Then you count the weekends. Twelve weekends is twenty...
How to build a wooden piece of furniture yourself?
DIY Home made furniture rarely fails at the joint. It fails a season later, when the wood swells in an August kitchen and the joint that was...
Shelving Unit From Recycled/Reclaimed Materials
DIY The romantic part of building with reclaimed wood lasts about an hour. Then you are standing in front of a stack of boards of six different...
How to Refurbish Bedroom Cupboards ?
DIY Almost every guide to refurbishing wardrobe doors opens the same way: sand them down. That instruction is fine on a solid wood door and quietly...
Landscape designing from scratch?
DIY The blank garden is the one project where everybody starts at the wrong end. Nursery first, plan later, and by the second summer half of it is...
What is foundation plaster?
DIY Every village around here has one: the handsome old house whose base is blistering and flaking, five years after somebody rendered it in a good...
Cheap Bedroom Makeover (Under $100)
DIY Most bedroom makeovers billed as costing under 100 dollars quietly add up to nearer two hundred by the last paragraph. The trick is not finding...
